The Chronicles of Nani

These Are Some More of My Favorite Things

2012-01-28T23:17:00.002-05:00

I told everyone I was following Marti’s lead at Marvi Marti on the “Things I Love” and yesterday she did list 2, “10 Websites I Love.” My lists are in no particular order. There might be a website I love more than one of activities I love that I listed a couple weeks ago. So, in NO particular order, here are 10 websites I love!

10 Websites I Love

1. Digital Scrapbooking Studio
This is the Digital Scrapbooking site I call “home.” I’m not as challengey as usual right now because the project I’m working on doesn’t so much lend itself to challenges. It IS the challenge and it would take too much of my work on it time to t4y to squeeze it into a challenge mold. I figure I’ll be back to challenges and Creative Team duties by the end of next month.

2. Playlist
Thanks to Edna of Miss Edna’s Place for directing me to this site. It’s the source of the playlist at the bottom of The Chronicles of Nani and also I site I’ve often gone to when I want some music while I’m cooking. They have some great featured playlists, including pretty much whatever genre my mood calls for be it dance music, hip hop, country or classical, and yes, the mood will strike me for any of those. I even favorited a Frank Sinatra list for myself!

3. Amazon
I LOVE Amazon! It’s not just Home of my personal collection of Kindle nooks, but I pretty much always get my textbooks for school there too, always a little to a LOT cheaper than the bookstore at school. I also got my first year as an Amazon Prime member free because I’m a student. Now I still get half off as a student and even at full price it’s worth every penny! How can you beat free 2-day shipping on pretty much everything! There are other sellers who post through Amazon, so if Amazon doesn’t actually carry it, they can hook you up with someone who does. I’ve also gotten MP3 credits when I order text books and, oh yeah, Amazon is where I spend 45 minutes a day, sometimes twice, to watch episodes of Buffy The Vampire Slayer for free as a Prime member. Most of my gift shopping is through Amazon. My fuzzy red slippers were from Amazon and most recently, my feather duster set got here just in time for the ceiling dusting!

4. IKEA
This one is recent. IKEA is key in a lot of the shelving and organizing items I’m using for the white tornado project. It’s also where I found the kit for the chest of drawers and night stand I’ve needed to replace for a while.

5. Site Meter
I’m a stats junkie! Sit Meter is where I see how many people visit the Chronicles of Nani and from where they come when they visit. It lets me know what posts get the most hits so I can “serve the drinks everyone in my Cyber Coffee Shop likes the best!”

6. Pinterest
This is new for me, thanks to Marti for the invite! I read a pinned quote on Pinterest that “Pinterest is like Fantasy Football for women.” I think that’s fairly accurate! It’s a great place to share ideas. I’ve repinned and pinned some great recipes and craft ideas. It’s where the Stuffed Pepper Soup recipe came from and an organizational craft project I’m working onto. I also pin things that I want to think about purchasing. Cool thing there is it links to where the photos come from so Pinterest itself organizes and keeps recipes, craft directions, my White Tornado plans.

If you’d like to see what I’m in to or follow me, I’m Nani_Noted on Pinterest.

7. Craft Crave
I check out Craft Crave every couple days to see what’s new in the scrapbook freebies. Sometimes I’ll see one element that finishes a layout to my satisfaction or a word art that inspires an entire layout. It‘s also a great place to see kits from possibly up and coming designers!

8. Good Search
I try to remember to use Good Search whenever I need to search for anything on the web. I’m signed up so that when I use Good Search it credits a few cents per click to our local chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. If you’re looking for something simple to do to “give back” and you’re looking for an organization to help out, try Good Search and use National MS Society Northwestern - Ohio Chapter as your charity of choice! I’d really appreciate that, but there are so many organizations that would benefit from a few cents per click, every click, every time and spread the word. It adds up!

9. Toledo Blade
I read my national news through assorted links from iGoogle, but the Toledo Blade is my local newspaper! I get my city and state information here!

10. Patients Like Me
I stop at patients like me at least once a day to check in and fill in the “Instant Me” feature. Remember, love analyzing stats here. I allows me to record how I’m feeling by time of day, day of week. I also communicate with others dealing with MS, even people taking the same medications as me!

Angel and Devil Break

2012-01-27T12:35:00.000-05:00

Another fun week in Blogland is drawing to a close. I’ve gotten pretty good with checking in, even just for a meme and a moment, daily. I wanted to do that for a while and I hope I can keep it up when my house project is done. We won’t have to worry about that for a while. But scrapping and blogging do a great job of getting me a good rest when I need it during the day and keeping me away from food! The exception being that the fruit basket and my laptop share space in the dining room. But the fruit is a good thing! Better than overdosing on M&Ms!

Right now I’m taking a rest between jobs for the day and the big bag of pretzel M&Ms and my last Ambrosia apple are fighting for my attention. The M&Ms are on my right and the apple is on my left which is totally skewed from the classic devil/angel scenario. I didn’t have milk stuff at breakfast because I cooked hot breakfast, eggs and sausage. I should probably have yogurt. I don’t have enough shoulders!

I decided last night that since I’m just stronger and more coordinated in the beginning of the day, I’d assemble the bookshelf during the day. It’s never going to be upright before it’s finished (I assembled the other one just like it upstairs a few years ago) I could sit on the floor and assemble it. That’s what I’m doing next. David said to assemble what I can and he’ll finish it when he gets home tonight. I hope all he’ll have to do is upright it and put it in the annex. We’ll see how much I can finish before another break-time!

Before I get working on the bookshelf, I want to do this week’s Friday Fill-Ins.

Follow Friday Four Fill-Ins

Every Friday, Hilary at Feeling Beachie posts four fill-in statements. It’s fun to read everyone’s answers and see how different they all are! I copy the statements and answer before I read Hilary’s. It’s not a meme that requires lots of time to participate and it’s fun! Stop on over and join in!

This week’s statements:
1. Nothing is better than.____
2. I ___my ___ in ___but never ____
3. Those _____ that are always _____ make me want to ___________
4. My favorite _________________ is when __________________________.

1.. Nothing is better than the feeling of accomplishment when a project is complete.

2. I love my furry slippers in the morning but never find they’re quite warm enough at night. :(

3. Those Humane Society commercials that are always so sad make me want to adopt about 6 more cats! Scotty already refers to David and me as “That couple with the cats” because we had four at one time. We had all four cats for a while at each of our houses, but never as a permanent residence. Three has been, and is planned on being again, the highest number actually living with us.

4. My favorite coffee time is when I meet friends for coffee and we have no plans for after.

Friday By Request

2012-01-27T06:27:00.000-05:00

I’m sad this week. No new Friday By Request again. This week will be the last repost from Yahoo 2006. I had some really deep and some tough requests in 2007, so I’ll repost 2007 requests for February, including a request I’ll repost, but rewrite it. There are 2 reasons for that; it’s a television question for a show with new characters and the request came from a friend on Yahoo 360 who is still a BlogSpot friend! (If you think it’s you, drop me an email and let me know if you remember the request you made in 2007. hehe)

I know if I want to be challenged, I can use blog prompts. Tell Me Tuesdays are great challenges that I participate in but FBR is different. Tell me Tuesdays hone my writing and deepen my thinking, which is so good for my writing and I love doing them. But Friday By Request stretches my creativity. I don’t know what type of thing it will be or the tone. In the past it’s called on me to be funny, outrageous, soul-searching. I’ve been asked to do specific scrapbook layout challenges (No journaling, one photo, must have a hot pink dot, that sort of specific challenge) stories like you’ve seen this month or poetry on certain topics or using particular words. I’ve been asked to do crazy Photoshop photos and even an animation. If I lack the software or the skills that I can develop in a week, I’ll let you know. I’ll even still give you the link in my blog for stumping me.

Okay, my pathetic begging session is done. Let’s get on with the last Best of 2006!

Friday By Request

Originally posted on Yahoo 360, December 1, 2006
(When I lived in Michigan)

Well, now Friday By Request has come full around to “Go,” with a request from the man who started it. (Do I get $200 for landing on go?)

Last night, this request came from David at work via text message. I haven’t done a top ten list in a while. In honor of the forecasted snow coming our way in the MI/OH region, David wants to know my top ten things to do on cold snow days.

The Top 10 Things To Do On Cold Snow Days

for David

1. Sit INSIDE with a fire in the fireplace, sipping hot cocoa and WATCHING the snow fall outside!

2. Bundle up and shovel! - I’m serious! If your health is good, it’s a great total body workout. Of course don’t over do it and if you have any doubts about whether or not you’re in good enough shape, ask your doctor.

3. Crafts with the kids. If you’re snowed in, they are probably home too. Even something as simple as pull out a coloring book and crayons, color with them. It’ll take you back to a “snow day” when you were a kid.

4. Go out for a challenging drive in your 1994 Camaro Snow Mobile! Donuts in the dark on the Turnpike with semi’s coming at you, what an adrenaline rush!

5. Watch an old black and white movie. Snowy days are made for a big bowl of popcorn and a couple of Sonya Hennie movies.

6. Let your honey take you out in the cold to photograph trains. HINT - stop and buy wool socks and boots first. Another hint - you can never have on too many sets of long underwear!

7. Scrapbooking - A perfect day to catch up the pages from last summer!

8. Spend some quiet quality time with your pets. Those furry friends soothe the soul.

9. Bake Cookies. Be sure to play some cheery music while you’re in the kitchen and eat them while they’re still warm!

10. Write an entry in your Yahoo 360 blog so you can tell everyone about the crappy weather in Michigan! :)

The New and The Old

2012-01-26T11:48:00.000-05:00

We had a little dusting of snow this morning, or so David tells me. I didn’t look. I had commented on Edna’s blog yesterday that I tend to not look out the window in the morning this time of year. I guess it’s fear that I might see new snow. I love watching the sun rise but, even though I’m up before it rises at this time of year, I so very seldom see it rise in winter. The exception is if David and I are leaving for the day before sunrise. Then I see it - from a nice heated car! So the sun is up now and the rain has washed away the dusting. It’s just gloomy looking and wet!

I figured out how to mop sitting down yesterday! That means the area where my first bookshelf will go is swept, mopped and ready for the shelving unit! YAY! I’m really all over myself with the “I can do anything” today. I’m going to be involved in a job-seekers teleconference tonight from 7-8, but then I’ll assemble the unit after that. Yeah, I am more tired and all by evening, but I want to assemble the bookcase when someone else is home, just in case my ambition exceeds my ability and half way through it falls on me. :) If I can get it assembled tonight and David can move it in to the annex, tomorrow will be cookbook and appliance placement day so I can get things moved out of the other half of the room to sweep and mop there. I’ve got two more shelving units to buy and assemble before the annex and kitchen are done and then we’ll have two organized and super user-friendly rooms. I feel more energized and excited every day as I’m working on this project!

Vintage Thingy Thursday

These were from my Great Grandmother’s attic. They were my Great Grandfather’s books when he was an early teen. We only found these three. My guess, and it’s just my guess, is that he originally read the Tarzan series when they came out in magazines and he bought the books for the stories he really liked. Or possible, he had at least all of the earlier books and these were the three that survived until 2002 when I found them.

The Return of Tarzan was the second book in the Tarzan series. It was published in issues of New Story Magazine from June to December of 1913 and the first book was published by AC McClurg in 1915.

Copyright page, The Return of Tarzan

That’s the publishing information from The Return of Tarzan. The other two books are not original editions of the book. They are still super cool finds for an old paper nut like me.

See more vintage treasures at Suzanne’s blog, The Coloradolady.

Wednesday Hodge Podge

2012-01-25T12:52:00.000-05:00

1.. The NFL playoffs were held this past weekend and this year's Superbowl lineup will feature The New York Giants versus The New England Patriots. How do you define 'patriot'?

Super Bowl Champions? :)

A patriot is one who thinks of country before self. Today, there are more football patriots than American patriots.

2. What's something in your life right now that feels like a 'giant'?

The reorganizing project in the house, which is just a nail and hammer away from remodeling. I’m making decent progress though. Tomorrow is assemble the first shelving unit day!

3. What's the first thing that comes to mind when you think back to being 18?

Voting! I turned 18 in a Presidential election year and I was pretty excited about voting. My birthday was a Sunday, but I was at the Secretary of State office on Monday to register.

Many presidents for whom I didn’t vote lived in the White House before a candidate for whom I voted did, but I finally felt like I had a right to complain about it!

4. Coconut-mashed potatoes-vanilla ice cream-mayonnaise...which white food would be the hardest to give up?

That one’s easy. Vanilla ice cream; there would be no Baseball Nut ice cream without it!

5. Describe an incident or a day you remember as the coldest you've ever experienced?

Once the temperature drops below70 outside, I’m pretty much cold all the time, unless I’m in bed or someplace with heat. Right now I’m wearing the thick fleece robe I always wear over jammas or clothes at home and my furry house slippers!

The coldest I remember in my mind was ice fishing when I was little and I think that’s where my intense dislike for cold came from. It was a family adventure when I was 6 or 7 years old. It was cold enough that the ice on the lake was thick enough to drive on to get to the shanty for fishing. Everyone was in snowmobile suits with ski masks and gloves, much layered warm clothing. They sent my brother and me outside to play. I guess it’s because we were restless in the shanty. I remember being so cold that I was sitting next to the ice shanty balled up and rocking back and forth praying. You see, it was supposed to be fun and I felt bad that I wasn’t having fun at all. In fact, I was praying that God wouldn’t let me die from the cold because it would make my parents feel bad if I died. I was a kid. That is what I remember thinking, that it would hurt their feelings if I died.

That memory has never left me and I don’t think I’ve ever perceived I was that cold. It was the most terrified I remember being of the cold.

6. You're hosting a brunch...what's your favorite dish to prepare and serve?

I could say “waffles” because David cooks the waffles. :)

Seriously, if I’m hosting the brunch, my specialty is cinnamon chip pancakes.

7. How do you combat negative thinking?

I write in my journal about it. Sometimes it takes a few pages, or even a couple days of writing if something is really bugging me, but I usually find the answer to getting over my troubles.

8. Insert your own random thought here.

I made stuffed pepper soup Sunday with a recipe I found online. I did a half batch, which was 3 servings. I had the last one for lunch yesterday and I don’t know what I’m gonna do now that it’s gone! Oh my, it was HEAVEN! I need to make a huge pot of it to freeze!

Click photo for recipe

Come join Joyce at From This Side of The Pond and share your Hodge Podge of answers!

Photoblog Wednesday

2012-01-25T06:00:00.000-05:00

Baggle??

This was taken in 2007 when I was unpacking boxes and unwrapping goodies when I moved in. Kaline had never seen my milk pitcher before! She stepped over everything else on the table to get a closer look.

Mom had gotten it for me back when I had the coffee bar in my modern room. She thought the tuxedo cat had just the right amount of class and the right Nani-flair.

It seemed Kaline thought it had just the right amount of looking like a cat to be confusing!

I Forget…

2012-01-24T15:34:00.001-05:00

(This one ended up being a little long, so top off
your favorite afternoon beverage before reading!)

It’s not that I forgot something. It’s would I choose to forget!

That’s this week’s Tell Me Tuesday topic at the Coloradolady; Memories. Here is the exact question about memories for this week:

“Would you rather lose all of your old memories,

or never to be able to make new ones?”

That’s a pretty heavy question!

Memories are something to cherish. Ideally you learn from the bad ones and build your character from the good ones. They are your past and the foundation of who you are. That’s why I scrapbook, the pages are my character. They are the events, people I love and the things that have influenced me told through my page designs and journaling. It’s how I perceive my world and that perception is who I am in the world as a whole. Even when I do a page about something less-than-happy, even tragic, I scrap/journal about the takeaway, the good I did find in it. I’m an optimist and those scrapbooks truly do represent my character.

In the pages of my personal journals, the pages which have been unseen by anyone else and will remain that way, is a combination of the positive things and the negative. It is a good representation of my life, but not who I choose to be. When I’m angry, writing about it helps me diffuse it. When I’m sad it helps to lift the clouds. It has let me get over frustration about a decision I thought was a bad one that someone else made that didn’t really have an effect on me and it’s helped me realize countless times that my anger was actually fear. Internal fear was a much easier foe to defeat than the perceived outer attack. In essence those journals are the supplies in the craft room where I create my character. I wouldn’t want someone to see all the scraps on the floor, just the finished work. Except in the case of character, the work is never finished. I still don’t want anyone looking at my unvacuumed floor, just what I have on display.

So, my memories are precious to me. At what cost would I let them go?

Well, if I am unable to make new memories, I’m dead or in a coma and if I’ll never make new memories, I’m never coming out of the coma. I’ve never heard about someone coming out of a coma and truly remembering what it was like to be in a coma. Depending on what your belief is about the afterlife, those memories of self wouldn’t be important.

If the essence of your soul returns to the greater soul of God, “self” is nonexistent. If you remain intact and reside in Heaven in God’s World, with Him but not “part of" Him, it becomes a different philosophical question about whether or not Heaven is indeed perfect. What I mean is I’d feel pretty bad as the only angel in Heaven who wasn’t able to talk about their people at the Coffee Cloud. If keeping my memories is part of Heaven’s perfection and I gave them up, I made a BAD deal with the wrong dealer! If I’m reincarnated, I won’t remember anyway, since I don’t now. And if I just die, end of story, well, that’s the end of the story. Point being that no matter what, my memories aren’t important after death, or I’ll get them back anyway, there’s no point in dying to hold on to them.

Of course, there are two very similar alternatives to dead or in a coma to having no memories and would give you at least minor ability to make new ones. I could have amnesia or dementia/Alzheimer's. With dementia or Alzheimer’s the memories slowly fade away, the most recent ones first. I’ve watched relatives mentally dwindle away. After seeing it with my great-grandmother, Grandma started to learn new things and exercise her mind. She was almost 80 when she learned how to use the computer, she quilted and did word puzzles every day. She was bound and determined not to be like her mother. Still her memory started to fade just before her death.

I remember the day that I went to visit Mums and she had no idea who I was. I’d always been so close to my great grandmother. It was a pleasant visit. She thought I was a nice stranger and invited me to visit again if I wanted. I was crying so hard when I got home it’s a wonder I drove the two miles safely. Grandma was a little more prepared a year later when Mums giggled and told her she was way too old to be her daughter, “Wonda is just a little girl.” There were no memories. She didn’t remember our Tuesday coffees, me sleeping in the same room she did for a year, not even how she felt the day I was born. She didn’t remember being at Mom’s wedding or the wonderful stories from her granddaughter’s childhood and she didn’t remember her pride in Grandma’s promotion to management or how proud she was of her raising a daughter alone until Papa returned from the war. True she didn’t remember the bad things either, no memories of deaths, war, the Great Depression when she was a young mother. She wasn’t even really aware anymore by 9-11. And she seemed happy enough, pleasantly unaware. But she unwillingly hurt the people she loved. I couldn't stand to voluntarily be in that position.

Ah but, the diseases that rob us of our memories in advanced years don’t really give an opportunity to create new ones either, not ones we'll remember. So, I look at amnesia from some mental or physical trauma, as really the only way one can lose all memories and still create new ones. It’s a fascinating thought. How do you lose all your memories and retain everything that’s developed in you as a result of those memories? As you recuperate, wouldn't you start to get those memories back and isn’t that cheating if you made the choice to give them up?

After deep consideration, I think I’d give up my memories for amnesia, but with the clause that if they start to come back, I’m not in default of the agreement and as long as I can keep my scrapbooks.

You can join in on Tell Me Tuesday; you don’t have to write a term paper, I tend to get carried away sometimes. It’s a fun meme and it really gives you a great chance to look inside yourself or share your thoughts on how you’d like things to be.

Barn Charm

2012-01-23T22:22:00.001-05:00

Cuyahoga County Bicentennial Barn

There are a few pretty cool distinctions about this barn.

First, it’s yellow. Maybe some might call it a very yellow beige, but it's not a common barn color!

Cleveland is in Cuyahoga County and it’s a pretty metropolitan/suburban area. As David understood it, they had a hard time finding a barn in Cuyahoga County. In every other county the barn awarded the Ohio Bicentennial logo had to be very well kept and the face to be painted had to be clearly visible from a main road. For Cuyahoga County, it needed to be a barn. Take a look beyond the barn. It’s at the entrance of a very current style subdivision!

It’s probably the only barn in Cuyahoga County. From the research I’ve found, it’s not an abandoned barn, but I haven’t discovered for what it’s used, if it’s used at all.

See more classic, modern, weathered and unique barn’s at Tricia’s blog, Bluff Area Daily

Monday Mug Shot

2012-01-23T10:15:00.000-05:00

Bars

This was my lovely parting gift from my internship with Metrovision Cable in Farmington Hills, Michigan, in the spring of 1991. When I was a student at Specs Howard School of Broadcast Arts, I did two internships. I was studying both radio and RTV. In the early 90s, there were two tracks at Specs; radio engineering, RE classes, and Broadcast Redo and TV, RTV classes. My class was RTV11-90, the 11th Radio and Television class that started in 1990.

I did a radio internship with a news and talk station for 3 months and then I did one with Metrovision for TV production experience. I started the one with Metrovision in March, knowing that the internship wouldn’t end until after I’d finished school. I only needed one internship for my program. I just wanted the production experience because I’d decided I really wanted to work in production and NOT in news. When I started at Specs, I was sure I was going to be in something behind the scenes in television news. After 3 months with news media professionals in radio, I knew that I could never be comfortable working in news. I found myself with too many jaded people who found joy in the most devastating events. I never wanted to laugh at people suffering or get excited about war because it was “good for business.”

At Metrovision, I interned in the public access department, working with members of the community on their projects. I also had a project of my own that I was working on as part of the requirements for my internship. I assisted with teaching classes and learned as I worked with students too. These things set me up perfectly for my first real paying job. I was the Public Access coordinator and Sports producer at Omnicom less than a year later. I taught the classes I assisted with as an intern and also produced local and high school sports for the local origination channel, the difference being public access was programming produced by the cable company’s customers and local origination was produced by professionals, company employees, highlighting local events. Local Origination was a great place for an entry-level job because it taught and expanded skills in every aspect of production.

I loved that internship and it completely groomed me for that first job that I loved even more. I found that I enjoyed working with volunteers in the community sand I enjoyed working with the professionals that also worked with them. I felt like I was really a part of the department even though I was just an intern and I learned how truly important that was to do for the interns that reported to me, make them feel like they were a part of everything that was going on. It made the internship experience a valuable one. On the last official day of my internship, I walked in to the office and the members of the department brought out this mug, filled with candy and balloons tied to it and a wonderful card of “graduation.” I still have that card with the many special cards I’ve kept over the years.

Short and Sweet (and Free)

2012-01-22T07:00:00.000-05:00

Today is a promise of sun in Cleveland. The goes with a promise of trains! I’ve been hiding from the cold inside this week, so the opportunity to spend the day with David…in the heated car…Is one I won’t pass up!

Before I leave, I wanted to get the link for part 2 of the Project 366 templates posted for the digi-scrappers. If you are visiting from one of the freebie sites, take a minute to check out the previous entry, Friday by Request, and the basics of getting started in digital scrapbooking. If you have thoughts to add, or other freebie sites to mention, please leave a comment. It helps those who read along and want to try sharing in our hobby!

Here is part 2:

Click preview to download.

Thanks or stopping by! Have a great Sunday!

Friday By Request – Digital Scrapbooking

2012-01-20T16:54:00.003-05:00

Jojo, of My Random Insanities left a comment on 100 things I love post last week asking about advice for someone just looking in to digital scrapbooking. We exchanged some emails and she made it an official request for Friday!

This could be a few weeks of posts, so it will be very link intensive. I want to welcome any of my scrapbooking friends who have any ideas or links to add, to please feel welcome to leave them in the comments!

Digital Scrapbooking – Getting Started

For Jojo

I love digital scrapbooking. My memory-recording started with simple plain photo albums back in my high school years. I progressed to captions, then almost scrapbooking in photo albums, then paper scrapping. Now I am fully a digital scrapbooker. I love that I don’t have to put everything away if I have to leave a page I’m working on, just hit save! There’s also no mess left on the table and no little snips of paper on the floor. There’s also the fact that my typing is much easier to read than my handwriting!

When I became curious about digital scrapbooking in the beginning of 2007, I already had an old copy of Photoshop 5.0 LE which was software in the package on my old Mac and I transferred it to the newer Mac. I’d already had some work experience doing simple graphics. 5.0 LE is a good program to learn and move into Photoshop Elements. You can get Photoshop 5.0 LE for less than $10 at Amazon.

I think Photoshop (PS) and Photoshop Elements (PSE) are the most common programs I see spoken of in the scrapbooking forums; however PaintShop Pro (PSP) is also fairly common. There are software suites made specifically for scrapbooking, but be sure to do your homework. Some software only works with elements offered by their company or only with their templates which is limiting to your variety and creativity.

There are a lot of free software or free trials that you can try out before you settle on which software works the best for you. Since I use Adobe products, I can tell you they do have 30-day free trials for Photoshop and Photoshop Elements. This will give you the opportunity to do a few pages as you learn the software before you decide on the software that’s right for you. There are lots of free tutorials for doing different things with the more popular software choices. You can always post questions about how to do things in the forums at the scrapbooking sites.

As for getting started, I’ll share how I got started. One thing to keep in mind about digital scrapbooking is that there are MANY alternatives for every aspect of the hobby, not just software! The first thing I’ll suggest is to check out a good digital scrapbooking community. My favorites are Digital Scrapbooking Studio and Ginger Scraps. The main elements that are useful at a digital scrapbooking site are the forums, challenges and store. Most sites have blogs now too. There are a lot of sites and stores out there. Don’t be afraid to sign up to join a few. They’re free to sign up and offer a lot of information and inspiration.

When I first started I got a lot of tips and encouragement doing challenges in the forums. At that time there were bonuses for participation but now the participation awards are usually a store discount. Many offer bigger discounts the more you participate. Challenges are great for learning new scrapbooking techniques.

Credits: Winter Bliss, Freebie kit by Dreams Fulfilled

Building up your scrapbooking stash so you can participate is not difficult. Many scrapbook designers create freebies that complement their kits and designers that are starting out create full kits for free for practice and you get their name out there.. While you’re getting started in the hobby, you can help them get started too! I will say that I don’t really recommend going to a store and purchasing kits for your first couple of pages if you are on a budget. I had enough in freebies to scrap for about two months as I was getting addicted to it. Then I knew I was going to stick with it and making a purchase was a safe investment. The first kit I purchased was My Wish by Jan Hosford. The colors were just SO me. It ended up being the kit I used for the first pages in the first book I had printed with digi-scrap work. I haven’t printed any of those pages I did the first month. I got better at it and then it was worth printing!

Speaking of printing! What DO you do with all those pages once they are done? I print mine in 11x11” books at Inkubook. I haven’t really talked to a lot of people about what they do with their layouts. I know others get them printed in books as well, but some print the pages individually and slide them into the plastic insert pages in traditional paper scrap books. I like to be able to add ephemera, ticket stubs and such, to my books, but I scan those things and make them part of my layouts. Some people print at home, either with a printer that will print a 12X12 page or they make 8-1/2X11 pages or print the square pages for an 8X8 book. Still others keep their pages as an online book to share with family via a link.

So, there’s the skeleton of the many choices to start a digital scrapbooking hobby. It’s a great opportunity to really be creatively expressive and you’ll meet and share with some great people in the digi-scrap community.

Links:

Jojo’s blog, My Random Insanities

These are places I enjoy for my scrapbooking needs:

Software:

Photoshop 5.0 LE at Amazon

Adobe, Photoshop and Photoshop Elements

Scrapbooking boutiques, forums and challenges:

Digital Scrapbooking Studio

Ginger Scraps

Freebies:

Digitalegacies Design freebies, right here at The Chronicles of Nani

If a freebie you’d like is expired, drop me an email and I’ll make sure you get it!

Craft Crave

Click blog next to Digital Scrapbooking Freebies

Creative Busy Hands

Printing:

Inkubook

Banana Diaries

2012-01-20T09:17:00.000-05:00

You might recall my blog entries about bananas. There are a few, I really like bananas. Truthfully, I really like a few fruits, but apples and bananas are my year-round favorites. Right now the fruit basket sits on the table right next where my laptop usually camps out. So last night when David called from the grocery store on the way home from work and asked if there was anything I needed, I saw 3 grapefruits and nothing else in the box so I said, bananas and apples.

I don’t like to say I “trained” my husband. If he needed fixing or training, it was stupid of me to marry him and I try not to do stupid things. But David is not a big fan of many fruits. He was just never a regular in the produce section before he met me. So I’ve shown him what I look for in some things in produce so when he calls and asks if I’d like him to pick anything up, he can pick up exactly what I would. So, he brought me two beautiful specimens of my favorite apples and a bunch of four bananas that were slightly green at the top. That makes for one this morning that is slightly firmer than perfect, Saturday and Sunday with perfect bananas and Monday with one that is slightly past perfect. I like my bananas solid yellow, no green at all and no brown spots.

In March of 2009, I did a Photoblog that was a photo essay called The Banana Days of Winter. In that photo essay I documented how fast a banana peel ages in the cold. It was 14 degrees outside when David came home last night. It wasn’t 14 degrees in Kroger, but it was outside and in the car where the bananas were transported in just a thin plastic bag. The bright yellow peels have some scuff marks. This doesn’t affect the fruit inside at all is the banana if momentarily exposed to the cold, but it makes the outside appear a little older than the banana is. So, this morning’s banana was about 2 days before perfect so not quite as sweet as I was expecting, a little too firm and I got that subtle sensation of a hairy tongue from it. So I think I’m going to wait until Sunday to start eating the rest!

Da-da-da-dum-dum-dum

Banana’s like the climate in your house or at the store

And I must wait an extra day, before I eat some more

For sure-sure-sure

Follow Friday Four Fill-in

This week’s statements:
1. I used to enjoy ______ but now I don’t really anymore except for when I____
2. My first job was ______
3. I am a bit obsessed with ________ at the moment
4. If I don’t have my ___________ at night, I don’t sleep well

I used to enjoy driving when I first started but now I don’t except when I am one of very few people on the road and it's a bright, sunny day with a perfectly repaired toad. (Which means I don’t enjoy driving much at all!)

My first job was a deli clerk.

I’m a bit obsessed with Buffy the Vampire Slayer at the moment. Since finding out I can watch every episode, I started with episode one and watch a couple a day. It’s been too long and I loved that show!

If I don’t have my extra blankets at night, I don’t sleep well. If I’m cold at all I can’t fall asleep and if I knock covers off, which I often do because to be warm enough to fall asleep I often get hot, I wake right up when I get a chill. I just have to be warm when I’m sleeping, period.

Stop on over to Hilary’s blog, Feeling Beachie, to check out more fun answers to the Friday Four Fill In or join in yourself!

Links:

The Banana Days of winter

Original Chiquita Banana Song (1940s Movie Ad)

My Grandfather Was a Very Smart Man, Really!

2012-01-19T14:02:00.000-05:00

Sn** - YUCK!

David wondered this morning if we weren’t in for our first appreciable snowfall of this winter today. I said “Shuh!” I always shush him when he uses language like that. I have a thick skin. I can handle hearing profanity without it burning my ears. But I find that four-letter-“s”-word beyond offensive. They use it on TV, I mute it and ignore it when it’s written and I still see it on the ground outside, practically sideways when the wind gusts. –Sigh- it brings other 4-letter-words to mind.

“Dan the Bug Man” as he calls himself with a chuckle, just left. He was in to do our bi-monthly anti-bug update. Orkin sprays around the house and in the house to keep pests out. The biggest and most important things are that it doesn’t deter our outdoor friends from enjoying our oak tree and yard, the squirrels and chipmunks are safe and most important, there’s been a DRASTIC reduction of spiders in the house. Dan said there were just a few spiders in the basement today but no mice. That makes me happy and Kaline notsomuch. But she’d get bored with the mice if we had lots of them, right?

Dan made me happy when he asked how I was doing. I told him the meds I was on for my MS were doing well and I felt great. He said I don’t look as tired as last time he saw me and I look like I have lots of energy now. I love that it’s apparent to others, not just me. I told Dan to “be safe” as he was leaving because the sn** was picking up and he’d already mentioned slick roads and “bumper cars” on the highway this morning.

About the title. When I found this treasure I was excited to brag for Vintage Thingie Thursday.

Papa’s Senior Year Report Card

It’s my grandfather’s high school report card from his senior year, 1940/41. He Went to high school in California, PA.

My grandfather was an incredibly intelligent man. He had an impeccable memory and wonderful logic. I was told that when he was in the Navy, he had to pass a sort of IQ test because the standard was higher for the Navy. I don’t really know all the details, but that he was in the Navy was a big deal at the time. I also always knew that Papa had fantastic grades all through school. Mom said that Papa was where the Mensa quality IQs came from, genetics.

I never doubted any of that. I always considered my Grandfather and my Mother the smartest people I knew. So I fully expected to see straight As, maybe a B in there since it was senior year. What I didn’t expect was this:

Huh? There were Bs and Cs!! One A final in science. Well, that one was okay, but how could this man, a genius in my eyes, have Cs, even a couple of Ds for card makings? Yes, I had a couple of Ds in freshman year. but that was freshman year, I wasn’t mature enough yet. This was his senior year!

Then, I looked at the “grade code.” Hmmm… It really was about the lessons and not the “self-esteem” then.

Papa’s average as a senior was pretty much a straight B. Only 15-27 students in 100 got a B. That A in science was something on 3-10 percent of students got. My high school grades were higher because I got the ”cost of living allowance.” A coke after school cost more for me too!

After realizing there was a huge grade adjustment, we don’t fail students now and we don’t have them do a grade over, we just give more As, I was pretty pleased with my Grandfather’s totals.

The other very cool thing about this treasure is on the back:

That’s my great-grandfather’s signature verifying that Papa’s parents indeed saw his report card. My grandfather was the baby of the family. I never got to meet my maternal-paternal great-grandfather. There’s something about things that are written or made by hand that is a very real connection to the past. My grandfather’s achievements and my great grandfather’s signature make this a very special treasure to me.

See more great vintage things at Suzanne’s blog, The Coloradolady!

More Hodge Podge

2012-01-18T06:00:00.000-05:00

1. A new Miss America was crowned on Saturday night-did you watch? If you were a contestant what would your talent be?

Didn’t watch. Didn’t even know it was on. I honestly don’t think I’ve ever watched it.

Is it really still Miss and not Ms. America?

If I was in the “Ms. Middle Age Plus Size Disabled America” contest my talent would be either the handful of really funny jokes I’ve come up with over the years or as a motivational speaker. But really as stage talent, I’d have to do an over the top funny motivational speaker and it would be a gag, so, I guess any way you slice it, comedy.

2. Do you have houseplants? Real or fake?

I have 3 living houseplants.

The gorgeous and aromatic rosemary bush Sheri gave me at Christmas went from beautiful and great smelling plant through the holidays to should have looked it up online for care instructions dry and brown by the second week in January. The card says after the holidays it makes great potpourri and that’s what I’m going to do, but in order for it to live, it needed sunlight that it wasn’t getting in my kitchen.

We managed to kill off the Christmas Cactus I had and there was a peace lily that dried out. But our home is NOT a houseplant graveyard! I have the “pumpkin plant,” Kalanchoe in a pumpkin shaped pot and 2 baby rubber tree plants. Spire was named before I realized baby rubber tree plants grow out and down, not up. I grew her son, Sprout, in water until there were roots and then planted him. He was a broken branch from Spire a few years ago and I’m so proud that I was able to help her procreate. :)

3. When you were in school did you speak up or were you more of the hide your face, avoid eye contact, and pray the teacher didn't call on you type of student?

I wad totally the speak up one! In a high school American literature class I was in, I freely debated with the teacher when we disagreed on an interpretation. When I raised my hand, everyone else put theirs down because they wanted to watch! I got my A and was asked “please don’t take one of my lit classes again.” Mom was proud – an instructor didn’t ask her not to take any of his classes after giving her an A until college.

4. Next Monday marks the Chinese New Year...what do you order when someone suggests Chinese food?

I have a few that I really like, but Kung Pao Chicken is my favorite!

5. How would you define a miracle? What would it take for you to consider something a miracle?

I’ve really never thought about definition a miracle. I’ll take the cop out on this one and say mere mortals aren't qualified to define or recognize miracles.

6. What's your favorite Disney song? If you're stuck you'll find a list here.

“Everybody Wants To Be A Cat.” or “Bella Notte”

7. I should have _____________ yesterday.

Taken a Benadryl and vegged on the couch

8. Insert your own random thought here.

I just found out that, as an Amazon Prime customer, I can watch every single episode of Buffy The Vampire Slayer streamed on my computer for free!! Where’s the popcorn?

Something New & A Barn To View

2012-01-17T14:05:00.000-05:00

My something new today is that I’m joining Tell Me Tuesday at The Colorado Lady. Suzanne started this the first Tuesday of the year and I think I may do the first two weeks in my personal journal so I have all 52. Let me tell you about Tell Me Tuesday!

It’s actually not you telling me anything. It’s me telling you! Suzanne posts a question on Tuesdays and participants answer it truthfully. Some weeks have easier questions than others and the hope is maybe the writer learns a little something about themselves in the answering of the question too. I know that happens because I write when I’m troubled because it reveals things to me that I was keeping from myself. I can’ tell you how many times I’ve been writing or typing away in my personal journal when I’ve stopped and said, “Oh! That’s the REAL problem!” I’m looking to the weekly introspective opportunity too!

So, here’s this week’s question:

"What is the most important lesson you learned in the past year?

I could make this week’s answer real short and just say the most important thing I’ve learned in the past year is that I have MS. It turned out that MS was the biggest thing in my world last year.

I’ve NEVER liked spending any more time than I absolutely have to in doctor’s offices or hospitals. I was sure they’d only pump me full of drugs and make the pain worse. The biggest thing I learned from a year that had more baseball-free months than doctor-free months, a first from me in many, many years, was to trust doctors. If I had a dollar for every time a medical professional said, “Don’t worry, I won’t drop you, I won’t let you fall, I won’t lie to you,” well, that’d pay all of copays for the year. Looking back, it seems my mistrust was pretty apparent.

My year of doctors started with my primary care doctor once again assuring me he wouldn’t let me fall off the table when I was having a back manipulation done. Then it progressed to a neurosurgeon telling me a few times that he wouldn’t let me fall if I set down the cane and held his hands so he could see my balance. In September, when I’d started on one medication and knew I was soon to be started on another, I called the pharmacist to be sure I could take Benadryl for my allergies without dangerous interactions. I didn’t take a Benadryl until after I’d given the list of prescriptions and vitamins I’m taking to the pharmacist at the specialty pharmacy and two doctors and got the same opinion, that it was safe, from all 4 sources. l still, the first time I took a pill for my allergies, David had to be home and it had to be during the day, so I wouldn’t be alone or asleep, just in case.

I’m still careful about checking qualification and asking lots of questions, but I learning to trust. I don’t have just one doctor anymore; I have a team of doctors. Trough requests to have everything sent to my primary care doctor at home they ALL know what the other is doing. My doctor won’t drop me. My specialists won’t let me fall and my Physical Therapist won’t have me do something that will hurt me worse. I also trust the medications. As prescribed, they have made me feel so much better and the worst side effect so far is dry mouth, I’m always drinking more water. If ya gotta pick a side effect…

Because I’ve learned to trust doctors, I feel like myself again and I hobble a little better too. Turns out it was, indeed, a valuable lesson.

Bram Charm

This is one of the barns I shot last year on Election Day, 11/8:

Henry Township, Ohio

I love the way the rich red just pops out behind the cornfield. Yes, and the water tower in the shot totally adds to the coolness factor with me!

Here’s a close up shot we got from further up the road:

It’s a little weathered, but kept up well and it’s very productive looking. And that red is so rich!

See more great barns at Tricia’s Barn Charm on Bluff Area Daily

Links
The Colorado Lady
Bluff Area Daily

Monday Mug Shot

2012-01-16T14:30:00.002-05:00

Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum

Chattanooga, Tennessee

Vacation 1992 was in the beginning of November. It was just a couple weeks after my brother’s first wedding and our family had been far more involved in the planning than I ever thought a groom’s family was. (This was when I firmly decided that IF I ever got married, I wanted nothing to do with a wedding.) I had started to plan my vacation week in September. Mom usually went with me. She and I were great travel companions. We were going to Atlanta by way of Chattanooga, a couple of my favorite cities. When Mom and I went on fall vacations we always asked Pop to go with us and he always had a reason that he wasn’t interested in going, but we tried every year. In 92, frazzled and celebrated out from the wedding, Dad took us up on the offer!

Pop’s birthday is November 8th and that was the Sunday of our trip, the first night in Chattanooga. My father is the one who got me hooked on trains when I was a small child, counting cars when we were stopped, even timing the stop when a train was coming so we had front row viewing. H loves train travel and we often traveled by train on trip when it was possible. Because he wound up with a daughter nuttier about trains than he is, he completely accepted that it was MY choice to stay at Holiday Inn Chattanooga Choo-Choo.

The background here is that I liked the idea at staying at the Chattanooga Choo-Choo Holiday Inn, and more that I really wanted to stay in one of the guest rooms outside which were passenger cars transformed into rooms on tracks in the courtyard with the Chattanooga Choo-Choo engine. I wouldn’t spend the extra it takes to stay in the specialty rooms in town on a whim for myself, but for my Dad’s birthday, it would be totally worth it as a surprise! So, I reserved a passenger car room, but didn’t tell Dad. He thought we’d be in the hotel. Then I ordered a balloon bouquet and a cake to be in the room when we checked in. Before we left, after confirming that everything was set, I slipped a bottle of Asti Spumate in my suitcase. I was excited ab0ut Pop’s birthday, till a hotel night and a day away!

We left around 6:00 Saturday morning and headed south. It was a usual trip south with stops for meals and exiting to see sights or shop at anything that struck our fancy from road signs and travel brochures on the way. We played a road game where you looked for words on signs for every letter in the alphabet. This is the trip where, after looking for a “V” for a very long time, Pop saw a sign and announced, “Vah-Vaffle House!” Saying it was two Vs in Italian. Yes, Pop is where I get my bold and obvious attempts at cheating in games!

We stayed that first night in Corbin, Kentucky. I’d stayed in Corbin a time or two on the way to Atlanta because it was just a good stopping point on the first day and it never occurred to me, I never cared, that Corbin is in a dry county. After an all-day drive, my Dad wanted to unwind with a bottle of wine and some snacks. When he asked at the gas station next to our hotel when he could buy a bottle of wine, the woman’s behind the counter said, “Honey, you’re in a DRY COUNTY!” Pop was shocked. Dry County? He’d never heard of such a thing! We ended up taking a drive before dinner and sure enough we ended up almost an hour back north in Richmond, NOT a dry county. Pop got a couple bottles of wine and we had dinner before we headed back to Corbin. I sensed that drinking a glass of wine in a dry county made it taste even sweeter.

On Sunday we got into Chattanooga by a little after noon and went to the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum. Mom enjoyed the museum, as she always did enjoy the trains when we travelled, but Pop and I were in heaven. There were engines and cars and water tanks and all sorts of very cool railroad stuff, as well as a working turntable. Many steam engines can’t go backwards for any lengthy of time and had to be turned around for return trips by rolling onto the turn table which then turned around 180 degrees so the engine could leave the turntable facing to opposite direction. I was very cool to watch! We also took a steam trip on the museum’s tourist ride, a stem powered excursion through some beautiful wooded areas with fall colors still holding on to some of the trees and a ride over a very tall trestle with a both breathtaking and harrowing view.

After a few hours with the trains, there were more trains! We went to the hotel, “my” choice, the Holiday Inn Chattanooga Choo-Choo. While my parents marveled at the opulent lobby, Mom was in on the surprise for Pop and kept him distracted, I checked in and made sure everything was set. Remember it was my father’s birthday and neither Mom nor I had acknowledged it all day. I let them know we were checked in and could put our bags in the room before dinner.

Pop was a little confused when instead of towards the hall, we went outside to the courtyard. I explained that they had passenger cars that were transformed into room. When we got to our car I stopped and said, “Here’s our room!”

Pop looked surprised and smiled. Then he asked me how much a room like this costs. I told him to never mind because it’s something I wanted to do, so it was worth it to me to save up. When we got in it looked like the entrance to a passenger car, the thin hallway had the very spacious for a train bathroom with décor and amenities that matched the grandeur of the lobby. A little further down was the main living area with a queen bed and daybed, refrigerator and microwave, all the look and feel of a high-end hotel room. But the first thing my Dad noticed was how all-out they went. “They even left balloons!”

The balloons were attached to a coffee mug filled with chocolate kisses. I told him to read the balloon. It said “Happy Birthday Popsie.” He looked at me with a huge grin and gave an equally huge hug. He opened the cake and said we could have it after dinner with the other bottle of wine he’d gotten in Richmond.

“How about with the Asti I brought from Michigan?” I smiled.

I got a little harassment because we’d ended up so far north before we got a bottle of wine the night before, but really, explaining why I was travelling with a bottle of sparkling wine would have inevitably spoiled the surprise.

I was a mushy moment and a fun evening enjoying cake and champagne after dinner in our private train car.

Links

Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum

100 Things I Love

2012-01-15T22:32:00.000-05:00

It’s not an original idea of mine. I’m riding coattails! Marvi Marti posted the first ten things on her list today. She initially got the prompt from Abundance Blog at Marelisa Online. The list is done in tens, Marti did her first ten today, so now I am too.

Okay, let’s get this love-fest started!

10 Activities I Love

1. Baseball Games - I love baseball and I don’t really think there was a time I didn’t.. I’ve told the story about Mom dancing with me when the Tigers won the 1968 World Series and how much I loved following the Tigers and Reds as a kid. I saw a game in the 1984 World Series and watched the final game in an all ages club on the big screen with my parents. I was allowed to TRY to watch the Reds World Series games in the 70s, but my single-digit aged self couldn’t make it.

Last year, David and I tied my season high of 21 games seen, finishing it with a Division Series Tigers game. Would have broken the record if the Tigers had made it to the World Series. We had tickets.

My current dream is to be in Cincinnati on Opening Day

2. Train Chasing - It’s funny. When I finished trade school, I had firmly decided I was moving to Atlanta. My first interview was with Green Frog Productions, a railroad video company in Marietta, Georgia. I loved trains and the entire thought of chasing trains and videotaping them was just an incredible idea to me. Alas, I didn’t get the job and while my Mom went with me to museums and on tourist trains, she wasn’t going to go chase freight trains so I could photograph them and there wasn’t anyone else who would even go to the museums with me.

14 years later I replied to an email inviting me to a presentation at a Mensa event. I had no idea who the man was that was inviting me, but the presentation was trains he’d photographed, his hobby. This man did that I had wanted to do so many years ago. When I emailed back and said, “Trains, I’ll definitely be there,” it led to a few emails exchanged, an invitation to a baseball game for a first date and, well, we’ve been married 3 years now. We still love to chase trains together!

3. Scrapbooking – My scrapbooking is both the pictorial record of my life and an art, my self-expression. It’s evolved from photo albums from high school, most of the photos with no names or places, to photos with captions, hand-written, raped on paper strips. Then it became pages with ephemeris and typed and cut out captions and title on magnetic pages, followed by actual paper scrap pages and after a short while of printing the photos from my first digital camera, I started digital scrapping. That was 2007 and I was scrapping 2005. It was a couple years of “can’t afford to print the photos,” that put me behind. I’m catching up now.

4. Baking – I love kitchen stuff in general, I come from a long line of great cooks and I grew up with the kitchen gadgets in several drawers and a utensil pot next to the stove. That’s why the obsession with my future kitchen. I designed it in my mind and my storage is full of boxes of peach and greed gadgets, dishes and calicos. I have a green calico kitchen cat and a kitchen pig wand. The pig want removes the calories when you wave it over the food. :)

I’ve made my own recipes for many things from scratch or by doctoring up ready-made things, but I love baking the most of all the kitchen-crafts. Baking allows my culinary gifts to really shine and while a good meal makes people feel satisfied and they enjoy it, something baked and sweet always make everyone smile!

5. Board Games – I love games night with friends, I love just playing Yahtzee or Qwirkle at home with David. Games give your brain some good exercise and they aren’t like concerts or other activities you do outside someone’s home because it’s quieter. It allows for conversation and quality time with the other people of your choice.

6. Having Coffee – Coffee is not just a drink. To me “Having Coffee” is being with a friend of two for conversation. The act of having coffee with someone is much more intimate than just a beverage. I used to have coffee with my great grandmother every Tuesday once I started driving, I had coffee with Grandma on the phone on Mondays and I make a point of having coffee with friends in Michigan at least once or twice a month.

7. Aunting – Kids just get cooler and cooler as they get older! I truly enjoyed the time spent with Tori and Rina when they were little, helping them learn and learning from them too. As they got older and could learn at a higher level, it was fun watching them figure things out and then form their own opinions about things. Now they drive when they are over and we share many things we have in common and can debate, in a civilized way, they things we see differently. I mean, last mouth I had a political discussion with the baby I comforted when she had a tummy ache. How cool is that?

8. Reading – Since getting my Kindle, the old one with the grey background and black writing, I’m enjoying reading with a new vigor. You see that darker background has solved whatever conditions cause my dyslexia and I read much more comfortably and faster. I LOVE my murder mysteries!

9. Coin Collecting – this is something I started doing with Grandma, who did it with her uncle. My biggest passion in coins is pennies. I collect both American and Canadian pennies. My oldest Canadians are 1920 something and the oldest American ones are Indian heads!

10. Cleaning and Organizing – I think I would have to say I love this in the same way any addict loves getting their fix. Once I got started cleaning and organizing in the annex, I found myself in that addict spot. I can not pick up something when I’m near it. It’s a healthy obsession!

Whew! Okay, I see why it needs to be broken up into segments! Net ten will be…soon!

Links

Marvi Marti

Abundance Blog at Marelisa Online.

Changes

2012-01-15T18:32:00.000-05:00

It’s been suggested to methat there is a difference between the text used and the way it’s used for sponsoredlinks and inline text links referenced in a regular post. Making names hyperlinks makes them easier forreaders who might be interested in more information. I pretty much agree. When I read a blog and come across ahyperlinked text, I usually right click and open in a new window, since someblogs that I read don’t automatically open links in a new window.

Part of my concern has beenthat when text is clicked and a new window opens, readers may not return tofinish reading my post. I do realizethat when I offer a scrapbooking freebie many visitors don’t read thepost. That really is okay. I want to share my templates and kits that Idesign. While reading my log or leavinga “thank you” is nice, I don’t consider it a requirement to download the giftand I don’t think any less of someone who only comes for the freebie and snagsit and leaves. The download number goingup tells my ego I did well. Still, I dolove and appreciate comments!

The new Blogger posting interfaceallows for automatically opening text links in a new window instead of havingto go back in and add the code for it to do that. So, if the text that’s linked is a propername in an unsponsored post, it will take you exactly where you expect it will. The hyperlinked names in this blog bring youto other blogs or the specific site mentioned. Sponsored posts that don’t require identification as a sponsored post beforethe blog post, some require that disclosure be site-wide only and not as partof the post, are labeled “good ideas.” To further identify UNsposored posts, I’ll still use the Links list atthe end of the post.

Okay. New real blog post will be up in a fewhours. Thanks!

Football, Flora and a Freebie

2012-01-15T00:24:00.000-05:00

Congratulations to the New England Patriots for their 45-10 victory over the Denver Broncos! Tom Brady tied the record for most touchdown passes in a playoff game. The Pats scored early…then often. Now it’s onward and keep winning!

The Lions’ loss last week means that I won’t be tested in the Super Bowl. Remember when I said that I was sure I’d cheer for the Braves against the Reds in the 1995 National League Championship Series, but found out that I just couldn’t do it? Well, I always say that I took the Patriots as my football team because it was in my wedding vows to take David’s football team. Keeping my baseball teams was in the pre-nup! I guess it would be the ultimate test of my loyalty for the Lions and Patriots to face each other in the biggest sports event of the year, but it’s not to happen this year. I wonder, if it happens and I find myself unable to cheer against the team I grew up with, is that grounds to end the marriage??

I’m not as passionate about football as I am about baseball, so I think I’ll be okay, if it ever happens.

That plant was a surprise that David brought out of Giant Eagle in Cleveland when we were there for a medical appointment for me. It’s a 2-hour drive and I can only drive just over an hour before I get incredible pain in my right hamstring, so David has to drive me. I try to schedule things on his regular days off so he doesn’t have to shuffle his schedule. So, he drives, takes me to my favorite restaurant for lunch and that day he stopped at Giant Eagle to get me a couple packages of Butterfly Bakery sugar free Chocolate muffins. The selection of Butterfly Bakery products in Toledo is very limited and I’m especially fond of the chocolate muffins. I waited in the car while he ran in to the store. He came out with the “pumpkin flower.” He said it had my name written all over the terracotta pumpkin bowl!

Now a question: Does anyone reading know what kind of plant it is? There was no label to tell me! It’s a beautiful plant, but I’m not sure what to do to take care of it. Since it came home in November, all the original flowers dried up. Many of them fell off on their own and others I brushed my hand on to knock them off. I keep it watered and it has a place in the window in the kitchen annex, so it gets Northern exposure. There are a couple of new flowers and new leaves, so I’m not doing anything totally wrong. I’d just like to know what kind of plant it is!

Project 365…366 Templates

I did two sets of templates that I sold in my Scrap Bird store in 2009, plus a blog freebie that went with the set. Templates for 9 weeks of project 365 or templates that will accommodate 63 photos of events you’d like to scrap. For 2012, I’m rereleasing those templates as freebies! On each of the remaining Sundays in January, I’ll release three templates from the set, culminating in a final freebie on my half birthday, January 29.

Here is the set for this week:

Click preview to download

I hope you all have a great Sunday. Thanks for stopping by!

Happy Friday the 13th!

2012-01-13T14:54:00.000-05:00

Top of the afternoon to you! Hope you’re having the “Luck o’ The Black Cats” today. Last year just before the Friday the 13th in May, Kaline declared Friday the 13th a holiday for everycat. “We’re all Black Cats on Friday the 13th.” I’m not totally clear, but much like the offices are empty at 5:01 on March 17th, the Catnip bars are full ~~aft~~er all day on Friday the 13th. Right now, our 2 black cats for today, are napping so they can party some more later!

Maybe that was Barbara Ann’s problem in the Friday By Request story this week. She went on that doomed date on Friday the 13th. I hope you got a chance to see the (best of) Friday By Request this week. It really is a very versatile challenge. You can request almost anything!

Kelly and her Dad got home safely. Kel called me last night at 9:40 to let me know they’d gotten in. I was glad the trip was only minorly eventful as far as the weather goes, but I am a little disappointed that the 1-3” overnight turned out to be a little more than a dusting, not even an inch, though. Not that I like the snow in even the smallest, miniscule, teeny tiny smidgen of a way, but Kelly and Dave left earlier because of the weather. I don’t like it when Murphy and Ma Nature gang up for a collective raspberry!

One thing we did do while they were here, I helped Kelly set up her very first blog! She’s at Coffee Cup Crafts and Christianity, http://coffeecupchristianity.blogspot.com. Her place is still under construction while she’s moving in, but she’s put up a few things and a couple short posts. Stop in and say hello!

I know once Kelly is moved in and posting, she and I will be trading links. If anyone else is interested in a link trade, let me know! You can grab my blinkie, if you right click and go to properties you can get the URL for the blinkie on the web or you can right click and save image as to save it to your computer. I’m a little rusty on Macs because I use a windows operation mouse on my Mac too. I just really prefer the windows mouse. But I think you can just click and hold to open in a new window for the URL and save to desktop to put it on your hard drive. Drop me a note at chroincilesofnani@gmail.comn and let me know your blog address for the trade!

A BIG THANK YOU to Kelly and Dave! While they were visiting, much as I said that I didn’t want housekeeping help while they were visiting, Kelly did laundry, which I put away this morning, and Dave installed the hand shower that David and I got when we exchanged the one from Christmas at Bed Bath and Beyond. This one is both a regular shower head and the hand shower, with many spray levels including 2 different levels of fire hose!! Mmm…showering is fun again! Thank you so much guys! I’m not mobile enough to even think of doing both in one week, let alone one day. With the stairs and all, Kelly did the laundry in one day that I do all week! I am blessed with the most awesome family I could dream of!

Okay, that’s what’s going on here for now. Back to Grandma’s last box in the annex. We’re almost ready to bring down and assemble the shelving unit!!

Friday Four

I leave you with my replies from Friday Four Fill-Ins at Feeling Beachie. Won’t you come over and join us?

This week’s statements:
1. I have never eaten ___
2. I like to ___ in ___
3. If I could go back and change one thing, it would be _______.
4. My greatest _____ for my ______ is ______.

I have never eaten headcheese and I never will! It grossed me out when I worked in a Deli when I was 16 and it’s still just too much obvious pig leftovers to fathom trying today. I prefer my “snouts and tails” hidden in a tasty hot-dog!

I like to have lots of blankets over me in bed!

If I could go back and change one thing, it would be nothing. I believe that changing anything would alter the present and I like the things in my present of which II had the power to control the outcome.

My greatest reason for my optimism is my spirituality and my wonderful family of relatives and friends.

Friday By Request

2012-01-13T07:00:00.000-05:00

For today's FBR, we're going back into the 2006 archives again. Last week I showed the very first ever Friday by Request on Yahoo 360, Poetry as only Nani can do it, as requested by my then boyfriend, David. Oh, I've go more bad poetry if you want it! I could also write some bad poetry just for you!

But this week is not poetry. I want to show you some of the versatility in FBR, that is how many different things readers have asked me to do. So this week I'll show you one I really had some fun with. It really was a challenge. Sheri gave me a "let's see if you can do THIS."

As I recall she enjoyed the read when it was posted!

Friday By Request
Originally posted on Yahoo 360, September 15, 2006

This week’s request was a fun “grab stuff from outside the box and make it all fit it IN the box” challenge. The challenge is from Sheri, and I think it’s better to let her explain it, so here is the cut and paste of the message she left me:

“ What I want you to do is tell a story using song titles in alphabetical order using as many letters of the alphabet as you can. Did that make sense?

An example:

This is a story about AMERICA THE BEAUTIFUL. It starts off on a night as dark as BLACK VELVET.

Something along those lines. Yes, you can use those song titles if you need to, that was just an example.

It'll be interesting to see what you come up with! :)”

I used 67 song titles, all the letters A-Z twice and once more up to O. So, here is what I came up with!

A Bad Night for a Good Girl

A story with a musical twist for Sheri

“Well, Another One Bites The Dust,” Barbara Ann thought as she stared into her morning Cup Of Life. “He thought I was Desperate But Not Serious. My heart sunk like the Edmund Fitzgerald.”

She pondered something stronger first thing the morning after. “Something For My Broken Heart. Give It To Me. Something to Help Me Hold On. I Can’t Hold Back the tears.”

Her mind drifted to last night. “Oh, James, Kiss Me Again. Let It Be Me.” she begged him in the back of her mind as their lips met.

“My List of the greatest kissers,” She said to Nobody in her empty breakfast nook, “I was ready to put his name on it Over And Over Again. Passionate Kisses, my Quest For Fire in my heart over. It sent my soul on a Rocket Ride. What a Smooth Operator. I was so Tempted.”

She’d been Up All Night thinking about it. If she wanted a reputation like Valerie has, she could have said “yes” when he suggested ”We’ve Got Tonight,” after they left the Club Xanadu.

“You Know Me Better Than That.” She told him and he closed up like a Zip-Lock. “Are You Sincere?” she asked him on the quiet ride home. Silence.

She could barely Breathe, she was so Caught Up in him, she really thought about saying “yes” on a first date. ”Why Don’t Cha?” she thought to herself. “Enough Is Enough. You give a little Flesh For Fantasy tonight and in the morning when he says ‘Good Morning Girl,’ he’ll be asking ‘Have I Told You Lately That I Love You?’”

“If I Had $1,000,000 for every girl dumb enough to think that.” she scolded herself. “A desperate cry of ‘Just Let Me Be In Love,’ is every decent woman’s Kryptonite.”

She knew if she’d said “Let’s Go,” in the morning he’d be gone. Miles And Years would pass before she saw him again, if she ever did, No Doubt About It. She didn’t want to be left Out In The Cold to Pick Up The Pieces of her reputation. “It defies the answers to all the Questions Of My Childhood about being respectable and safe,“ she told herself.

She looked out the window at the gray sky. It would be Raining On Sunday. After last night, maybe she just needed a Saturday Night alone and a day to let that rain Turn The Page on another weekend of dating frustration. “Unconditional love. That’s what I really want,” she said to the clouds. “Something that will fill my heart until the Very Last Moment In Time.”

She stirred the last sip in her cup. “Well, right now, I’m just Wishing for a second date, or at least a first one that doesn’t end X-Rated. Yeah, guys like that belong at a petting Zoo or a pig farm!”

She got up and refilled her cup. “I just don’t believe that All Of The Good Ones Are Taken! Today, I’m a Brand New Me,” she said with resolve. "I am my own Crusader. I will find someone who wants to Dance With Me without groping or looking at another woman Everytime I Close My Eyes.” She smiled “I’m gonna Find Me A Man who will share Good Times and make me a Happy Girl, accepting Infatuation as a wonderful feeling, if taken slow!”

Java Blues sunk in as she tipped the cup, spilling coffee all over the table. Still smiling, she folded up the soaked table cloth and put it in the sink. Her Momma, a strong Kentucky Woman, always told her to be be honorable. ‘There’s no one Like You, don’t let some man with a Mean Streak tell you otherwise.’”

“Momma’s right. I’ll Never Surrender, unless it’s ME making that decision!”

Finis

(Oh Sherrie, I hope you liked the story!)

The Songs Titles:
Another One Bites The Dust, Queen
Barbara Ann, The Beach Boys
(The) Cup Of Life, Ricky Martin
Desperate But Not Serious, Adam Ant
Edmund Fitzgerald, Gordon Lightfoot
For My Broken Heart, Reba McIntyre.
Give It To Me, 112
Help Me Hold On, Travis Tritt
I Can’t Hold Back, Survivor
James, Pat Metheny
Kiss Me Again, Toby Keith
Let It Be Me, The Everly Brothers
My List, Toby Keith
Nobody, Keith Sweat
Over And Over Again, Nelly with Tim McGraw
Passionate Kisses, Mary Chapin Carpenter
Quest For Fire, Iron Maiden
Rocket Ride, Kiss
Smooth Operator, Sade
Tempted, Marty Stuart
Up All Night, Boomtown Rats
Valerie, The Monkees
We’ve Got Tonight, Bob Seger
Xanadu, Rush
You Know Me Better Than That, George Strait
Zip-Lock, Lit
Are You Sincere, Andy Williams
Breathe, Faith Hill
Caught Up, Usher
Don’t Cha, Pussycat Dolls
Enough Is Enough, April Wine
Flesh For Fantasy, Billy Idol
Good Morning Girl, Journey
Have I Told You Lately That I Love You?, Rod Stewart
If I Had $1,000,000 , Barenaked Ladies
Just Let Me Be In Love,Tracy Byrd
Kryptonite, Three Doors Down
Let’s Go,The Cars
Miles And Years , Lionel Cartwright
No Doubt About It, Neil McCoy
Out In The Cold, Judas Priest
Pick Up The Pieces, Alexz Johnson
Questions Of My Childhood , Kansas
Raining On Sunday, Keith Urban
Saturday Night, Bay City Rollers
Turn The Page, Bob Seger
Unconditional, Gary Allan
Very Last Moment In Time, Lindsay Lohan
Wishing, A Flock Of Seagulls
X-Rated (Sub title of several songs - Hey, it’s X, cut me a little slack!)
Yeah, Usher
(The) Zoo, Scorpions
All Of The Good Ones Are Taken, Ian Hunter
Brand New Me, John Michael Montgomery
Crusader, Saxon
Dance With Me, Next
Everytime I Close My Eyes, Babyface
Find Me A Man, Toni Braxton
Good Times, Sam Cooke
Happy Girl, Martina McBride
Infatuation, Rod Stewart
Java Blues, Nazareth
Kentucky Woman, Neil Diamond
Like You, Bow Wow & Ciara
Mean Streak, Y&T
Never Surrender, Corey Hart
Oh Sherrie, Steve Perry

Are you ready to challenge me? Email your Friday Request to chroniclesofnani@gmail.com.

American Hamburgers

2012-01-12T18:22:00.000-05:00

It’s dark and not quite six. We’re expecting snow tonight! Just 1-3 inches tonight and another 1-3 tomorrow, but 2-6 inches is not good traveling snow! It is threatening enough that Kelly and Dave left this morning for home instead of thinking about maybe seeing a Walleye game tomorrow and heading back Saturday. :(

They are driving through snow but the last message I got, it was steady but not heavy. Roads sere a little rough, but not bad and they were getting through Indianapolis before rush hour I miss them both already, they’re planning a return trip in the late spring.

I’ve started back at my cleaning in the annex to the kitchen. I’ve got about a half box from Grandma’s to go through but I can’t really do a lot more until David helps me get some boxes moved to upstairs, storage or Good Will. Maybe the Good Will things can go in my trunk to take over on a less snow threatening day.

There are SO many photos! One of the next projects, probably a 2013, maybe 2013/14 project is to organize the photos, identify who is in them and scan like crazy! I have some cousins on both sides of the family on Mom’s side that I’ll offer dinner or coffee (or both) to if they’ll look at some photos and see if they can identify anyone. I really want that to be my only non-scrapbooking project when I get that started!

Since I still don’t have any new requests this week, Friday by Request for tomorrow will be another “Best of” from 2006. I’m inviting everyone to please read the “best of” entries and click the Friday by Request label and find some inspiration to give me a challenge! It’s fun and my challengers have usually enjoyed the sometimes surprises with my take on their challenges.

Vintage Thingie Thursday

My Vintage Thingie Thursday offering is something I am so excited about! Remember I love advertising and I really love old advertising I love things that have quirks or that feel personal. I have an ad that tells that Texaco is in all 48 states, that sort of thing makes it even more special to me. Today’s treasure is both dated and personal.

1949 White Castle Location Directory

The location directory from 1949 is about 3' X 4", pocketsize!

For those who aren’t familiar with White Castle, it’s Sliders. Nasty, dry, little mini burgers fried, topped with finely diced onions and little buns that are steamed on the fry-grill and topped with a pickle, and a squirt each of ketchup and mustard, tossed in little boxes. Even a child would eat more than one for a meal. And as a child, I loved ‘em!

We used to get them on occasion when we visited Noni. When she didn’t feel like cooking…Okay, that never happened, but occasionally she’d crave a hamburger and since the closest place that wasn’t a bar to her was White Castle for a long time, her “American Hamburger” was White Castle. When Noni, who always worked so hard in the kitchen, even thought it was an obvious labor of love, said she felt like hamburgers, we tallied up the numbers of people there and made a White Castle run!

We drove by that White Castle near where Noni lived not long ago. She lived in Detroit but near enough to the Melvindale border that her White Castle was the Melvindale, Michigan one. It’s still there today and, look:

The Melvindale location was there in 1949 too! I love die-cuts because it’s just more interesting than a rectangular or even square sheet. This die-cut, dated booklet with the location we used to get our White Castle burgers from is truly a treasure to me!

Photoblog Wednesday

2012-01-11T11:28:00.007-05:00

Nani, Kelly and Dave
Taken last night.

Kelly and I have a collection of photos of us mugging our parents! In 2010 when she visited, we got a shot of us mugging my Dad which was similar to a photo from 2002 with my Mom. Now we add her Dad to the gallery! I had said I wanted that photo after we did the shot with Pop in 2010 and now the collection is complete!

Kelly and her Dad are visiting for a few days before Kel’s next semester starts. We’re hoping to have lunch with Scotty tomorrow and of course, a coffee stop at Dunkin Donuts in Novi. They change the place, but who says you can’t go home? We do whenever we’re in town!

I occasionally like to combine regular features when I try out a new meme. Today, I’m trying out The Wednesday Hodge Podge, hosted by Joyce at This Side of the Pond. 7 questions to answer and one random thought. Simple enough and it’s one of my favorite blogging topics; my opinions! I’ve read Marti’s answers for a few weeks at Marti’s Musings and thought it sounded like a fun meme and since there isn’t a Meet Me On Monday right now, I thought trying out a new meme with be a good replacement this week!

1. Lake Superior University has once again banished a list of words/phrases they think should be banished from the Queen's English in 2012-

amazing, baby bump, shared sacrifice, occupy, blowback, man cave, the new normal, pet parent, win the future, ginormous, trickeration and thank you in advance.

Which of these words/phrases would you most like to see banished from everyday speech and why.

Well, out of the choices given, I’m not tired of any of them, really. I still do find a lot of amazing things in this world and I also fully accept that what’s amazing to me may not be so amazing to someone else and vice versa. It think shared sacrifice is the best way to get something less tasteful done because there are also shared rewards. I don't care about the political buzz word. When real people use it and mean it, it's productive. I think Occupy is the very beginning of a new and hopefully better political party in this country. I’m working on creating a man cave and a woman cave in our home. I think there needs to be both. I’ve really never heard of some of the phrases on the chopping block, I’m a proud cat-mom, married to a proud cat-dad, proud in a ginormous way. :P

I guess if I HAVE to pick one, it’d be “baby bump.” But only because I get tired of seeing photos of bare swelled tummies, nothing against the phrase. Call me a prude, but I don’t want to see bare pregnant bodies, bare fat bodies or bare muscle head bodies on general public things like blogs or billboards. Though I will admit that of the three, a pregnant body is the most beautiful because it’s natural. I find the muscles on top of muscles, even just “six-pack abs,” to be the least attractive because there is a conceit involved with baring that for all to see.

I’m tired of “it is what it is.” That phrase is a cop out for “there’s a problem but I’m too lazy to care if it ever gets fixed. I’M not gonna do it! But I do know it’s a problem.” Yuck!

2. Are you easily embarrassed?

Not really. I always worry about being in an embarrassing situation, but when they happen, I don’t get embarrassed. Maybe that’s because I worry about being embarrassed and it’s never as bad as I was afraid it could have been.

3. What is your go-to snack?

Organic carrots! I go insane when there aren’t carrots in the house and I prefer the full-size organic ones. There IS a difference!

(Back from getting a carrot – weak to the suggestion!)

4. Have you ever been to Washington DC? if not do you have any desire to go? What site/attraction would you most like to see in that city? If you have been what's your favorite site?

I was in Washington DC in 8th grade as a class trip. I have photos of a bunch of 8th grade kids goofing off and what I remember the most was that it was a trip on a plane with friends to another state without our parents. Really, that’s the coolest memory about it.

If I went back now, I’d really like to go to Starbucks and have coffee with the President and members of congress from both sides, including the congress members representing Ohio, to talk about healthcare. I think my ideas and their clout might have some powerful results. Even if my ideas aren’t fiscally realistic, they might spawn some other ideas that are better.

5. sit ups-planks-lunges-squats-which one do you hate the least?

Um, you said “souvlaki spanakopita pastitsio” what?

6. What's a small act of kindness someone did for you that you've never forgotten?

One day I was entering the bank. My walker was in the trunk. It’s usually in the back seat and getting it in and out is a science I’ve mastered, but not so much the trunk! I made my way to the back of the car and was wrestling with it, but not having great success getting it out. A man leaving the bank stopped and asked if he could help. I started to stubbornly say “no,” but smiled and accepted the help. He got the walker out of my trunk, checked to make sure that I had my keys before he closed it and went back with me to the door to the bank, holding them both open for me before he left to go to his own car. I always remember that time especially when I think about how much using the walker and wheelchair has shown me the best side of people time and time again.

When I think of that man in the bank parking lot, it always bring back the about 10-year-old girl who offered to help me with the door in the ladies room and stayed until she could hold the door open for me to leave the ladies room. If you take the time to see it, in spite of all the lesser people who make headlines, there are a lot of wonderful people in this world.

7. Have you ever been a blood donor?

When I was younger my blood pressure was always on the low side and honestly, I’d have to have juice and rest for 20 minutes after a blood-draw at the doctor’s office, so the thought was scary!

Now, after a year of so many blood draws last year, I think I might be able to do it, but I’m not sure if all the MS medications would taint my blood. I ought to find out. David gives platelets often.

8. Insert your own random thought here.

On becoming a woman.

As women, we emotionally try to keep little girls from crying. As a girl, you know when you’ve reached womanhood in another woman’s eyes because she starts doing things to make you cry on purpose. My nieces aren’t 18 yet, but I see them as women because I’m no longer just the cheerleader. Now I give them the mushy gifts that make them cry and I know I’ve done well when they do.

They've been emotionally women for a couple of years now!

Links:

Marti's Musings

Make Me Love My Job

2012-01-11T04:01:00.001-05:00

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Contest Factory. All opinions are 100% mine.

You can’t kick start your year better than a whole new job-world. Yes, I know this is the time of being grateful if you have job, but how about a whole new look at work to make that being grateful even easier?
Ever daydream at work about an updated computer? Maybe the lift you day needs is a new desk, chair and some brighter décor. How about, and this would be my dream job surroundings, a high-end stereo system and an espresso maker! Those are the three prize packages in the Pimp My Cube Contest

Contest Factory is holding the Pimp My Cube Contest Contest to award the most horrible, the neediest, work environment a makeover. They want to make YOUR job a happy one to have!

Getting your chance for a fabulous cube makeover is pretty simple. All you need is a smart phone or digital camera that will shoot a short video showing your workspace and why you need a break, every day, with some new digs.

Simply follow the link to the Pimp My Cube Contest and upload your video. Then direct your friends, family, coworkers or fellow bloggers to vote. Yes, it’s okay to offer to let a coworker borrow your new chair for a day or make them a cup of espresso when you win! The better your story and the funnier your video, the better your vote-getting chances, even from people you don’t know!

The contest runs until January 31 for submitting videos. Here’s a big hint – as of is posting, no one has submitted video! You really could be just an upload away from a plush new chair to relax a little in between calls or a rich, steamy espresso to beat those afternoon blues. How easy is that? Instead of anyone complaining that you’re complaining again, now you could win a great prize for complaining about your cube!

There will also be a $200 gift card awarded randomly as a second prize in the contest. That’s enough to get a cushy chair or padded wrist rests or take your supporting coworkers out for espresso. Have some fun, make your video and maybe see things start to be a little brighter at work!

Tuesday Barn Charm

2012-01-10T00:02:00.004-05:00

North of Goshen, Indiana

Taken on our first snow day-trip on November 30, 2011

We had to go to Indiana to find the snow then and we still haven’t had any to speak of in Toledo this winter!

Monday Mug Shot

2012-01-09T20:45:00.005-05:00

Stolen from Dunkin' Donuts, Novi, Michigan

No, that’s not a joke! It really is a stolen mug. I’m the one who stole it. The Statute of Limitations for petty theft in Michigan is 6 years. So I’m safe admitting it on my blog. I stole the mug in 1986 while I was employed by the Dunkin Donuts in Novi, Michigan. I’m not confessing. Well, I guess I actually just did confess, but that’s not the point. I’ve had employees steal things like this form before and I’d have stolen this mug for a customer had they asked too.

At the time we had a friend who went by “Denny” and often had dinner at Denny’s, his restaurant. (Wink, wink) We had schemed to steal just one place setting of the Denny’s logo flatware. Never did quite do that. We inquired about how much it would cost to buy a place setting for Denny, but were told they couldn’t sell it. Our waitress wrapped a setting in a napkin and presented it to him with an apology for “stealing his silverware” and “returned it to him." Because the reusable and breakable items are replaced often, restaurants usually had a certain amount that was expected to be lost and its good advertising if someone is using your logo at home

The sensible precedent had been set. As counter staff, I’d have given a cup to a customer who asked to buy one. It really was good advertising. We didn’t get requests much because my coworker and I worked the midnight shift and there were usually on-duty cops from the Michigan State Police precinct in Northville and the Novi officers. It would still have been okay, like I said, good advertising! Now almost any restaurant had items for sale with their logo. People will pay Dunkin Donuts to advertise for them now!

This was not a cup for sale when I was 19 and worked midnights. It was one of the cups we used to serve counter and booth customers. My Dunkin has changed there. If you go to the same D&D today, which is under new owners since I worked there, it’s been completely remodeled, is half Baskin Robbins ice cream and sells Dunkin Donuts coffee in “to go” cups for everyone. There are tables instead of a counter now and you’re welcome to have your coffee, donuts, sandwiches or ice cream there, but food and drink is served in nothing breakable or reusable n0owl.

Ah the old days at Dunkin. That Novi Dunkin Donuts is where Mom and I went for coffee after she took me to the mall to practice driving after hours. It’s also where I may John, who worked counters on the midnight shift. John was the first of my three best friends I met when I was only 15. He was 22 and he, Mom and I got to know each other well chatting after my lessons. John became a big brother to me and was one of my very best friends until he passed away in 2009. His sister asked me to be the first one to speak at his funeral to say something about our friendship and get the room warmed up a bit so others would feel comfortable. I could have talked a long time about what a great friend he was, but I only spoke a couple minutes until I couldn’t hold back the tears. How do you say goodbye to your oldest friend? After the luncheon, a group of us went to Dunkin Donuts in Novi to offer a coffee toast in his honor.

Scotty was with us that night we toasted John. I met Scotty there a couple years after I’d met John. Scotty became one of our group, the Zoo as my Mom called us. I was 17, he was 21. My closest friend in high school i0ntroduced us. She’d met Scott at the arcade where we all went on summer evenings. Scotty was and still is a rugged country boy with a sometimes intimidating exterior and the ultimate gentleman with a heart of gold. I think that’s one of the most endearing things about him when we met. Our misfit bunch was all not quite what we seemed.

Through Scotty, I met Kelly, a friend of his girlfriend at the time, in early 1988. Kelly just fit in with our group so well. She was recovering from a terrible accident, all scarred and stitched up, yet able to smile and she just blended in so well. I felt a connection with her. I admired her for meeting a group of strangers, her friend’s boyfriend’s friends, hobbling in with crutches and battle scars. She was beaten on the outside and warm and whole on the inside, a shell that was an illusion, like the rest of us. She and I became quick friends and to this day, I consider her my platonic soul mate.

I met my three best friends at that same Dunkin Donuts and we all drank from those very same cups like the one I brought home. Do I feel guilt in taking it so many years ago? Nah. Look at all the warm and fuzzy promoting it still does for Dunkin’!

Where It Finishes

2012-01-06T23:01:00.005-05:00

As Friday winds down to a finish, I wanted to check in. Still looking for Friday requests for next week. It might be more bad poetry if I don’t have a request – Eeks!! Actually in 2006, FBR was all about top ten lists and silly stories. I got some very serious and soul-searching request in 2007. That’s what FBR is all about. It can be anything, serious, funny, though-provoking or emotional. I just enjoy the challenge of writing outside of my comfort zone or coming out of my shell.

If you are interested in checking it out, I put my first regular post in It's About What I CAN Do, my MS blog. I hope that it's good for me to write it and also good for anyone looking for some positive inspiration to read. I've gone to a couple different sites where patients can communicate and offer each other support. The problem is I don't feel any love there! There's so much gloom and depression that it starts to make me feel bad reading it. Sorry, I have challenges I'm living with and handling well. I don’t want a toxic environment, so I've started the blog hoping I can give people dealing with MS, a loved one with it or just people who want to know, someplace where there actually is positive support.

It won't get easier with people saying how awful things are. It gets easier with people offering thoughts, ideas and actual support to make each day just a little better than the last. The disease isn't fatal and if I live another ten years or another fifty years, they'll be good ones. If I can give just one person with a chronic disease a better outlook, then it really does answer that "why me" question! The link for the blog is at the bottom and I'll be adding a sidebar icon in the next few days too.

David and I went to Bed, Bath and Beyond tonight to exchange the hand shower he got me for one that will work better for us. I wanted a hand shower that would still have a regular showerhead too. He’s not at all fond of hand showers. They move oddly and are usually too low as a regular shower for 6’5”! We also got my wand scanner. We picked up a few other things there too. BBB is a dangerous place for the pocketbook!

I did a little work on the annex this morning, but then my back and right side just got really weak. I took the quickest shower around because I was afraid I wouldn’t be strong enough to get out of the tub! So that was that for the annex for today. I listen to the body saying to take a day off! If I feel stronger tomorrow morning, I’ll get back to work on it. If not, it’s an all-day scrap day.

I did copy and paste into a word document the Friday Fill-Ins from Feeling Beachie last night before bed, I just haven’t posted yet, so while I still have a little Friday left…

This week’s statements:
1. ________ is not my strongest virtue (patience)
2. _________ is my favorite meal of the day
3. ___________ is my ____________
4. Whenever ____________ happens, I always _____________.

Resisting temptation is not my strongest virtue. I keep the basket with the last of the holiday chocolate behind my computer screen, but I can still see that red bow on top of it and I always end up having a couple pieces with my evening coffee. I have the points in the day to do a couple small pieces, but I wish I could resist better.

Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day, usually. It’s the one meal for which I’m not so busy I can’t make it a nice meal. Lunch is usually a quick cup of soup and raw vegetables, because I don’t even have time to cook and by dinner, the day is wearing on me and I make something good, but quick. David has much less adventurous taste than me, so dinner tends to be a little more ordinary too.

Scrapbooking is my stress relief. Yet I’m a couple years behind. Tells ya something, huh?

Whenever frustration happens, I always look for the fastest way to regain total control.

And so another week is done!

Links
It's About What I CAN Do

Where It Began

2012-01-05T22:35:00.005-05:00

That was the opening line to my very first favorite grownup song, Neil Diamond’s Sweet Caroline. But for today, Friday, I can totally “begin to know it,” and it not “going strong!” I’m trying to get 2012 started with some real interest in Friday By Request. So here’s what I’ll do for January.

If I don’t have a request for the week, I’ll repost from the first year of Friday By Request, back in the days of Yahoo 360. Today, I’m reposting the very first FBR ever. I hope these will be an example of what you can request and inspire my readers to challenge me!

================

Friday By Request
Originally Posted at Yahoo 360 Chronicles of Nani, August 4, 2006

All right bad poetry fans! I was writing poems last night, actually one about the cats, when David challenged me. "Why don’t you write a poem about the groceries?” So I did and it gave me an idea.

I will do Friday as “Friday By Request.” The first person to make a request before Wednesday will give me my challenge for Friday. It can be a topic for a poem, photo or the script for a TV or Radio ad. Try other ideas - challenge me! It can be for any topic or product, all I ask is that you remember this is a family blog. I have kids on my friends list! Send me your suggestions with the subject “For Friday?” through the Yahoo 360 messages. If I don’t have any requests on any given week, I won’t do the Friday By Request blog. If I have more than one, I’ll do the first one I get. If I don’t do yours, feel free to resubmit it any time after the Friday blog is posted.

It might be serious from time to time, but more often than not it will be bad, funny or both!

Without further ado, here is David’s request…

A Poem about Groceries
For David
Apples, oranges and plums
The fruit bowl cries for purpose
Lettuce, tomatoes and peppers
The poor crisper has none

Burgers chops and chicken
The freezer meat shelves empty
Ice cream, veggies and entrées
The top shelves barren too

Flour, sugar and coffee
The canisters sound so hollow
Cereal, soup and pasta
The cupboard shelves collect dust

Dinner rolls, cookies and Pop Tarts
The bread box, light as a feather
Cinnamon, chili and garlic
The spice rack bottles are clear

Let’s go to the grocery store!

================

There ya go, the very first FBR! Of course now, don’t send a Yahoo private message. These days requests for Friday can be sent to chroniclesofnani@gmail.com. If I have a request for next week, I’ll post it. If not, another repost as will be true for the month of January. Come on! Challenge me!

Cleaning Treasures

2012-01-05T11:01:00.005-05:00

The coolest thing about cleaning and organizing is not the ultimate reclaiming of rooms that have spent the last couple of years as essentially storage rooms. Do not get me wrong there. The prospect of getting our kitchen annex back to usable additional prep space for the kitchen and having a working office/studio for my projects is exciting. We have three rooms that have been stacking places for the boxes of things we’ve accumulated and two years of disarray in our lives. Between losing my Grandma 2 years ago and the legal responsibilities that went with being the administrator of her estate and the huge cleanup at her house, which is the biggest source of the many boxes all over my house, and my health trials last year, I’ve had no time, no energy, to keep up.

Last year the dust had settled, some literally, from Grandma’s estate and I’d planned test-surgery-recovery for my back that tuned into a half year of tests with symptoms of my eventual MS diagnosis getting worse. During the 2010 cleaning at Grandma's my back, hip and knee on the right side had gotten pretty bad and I was relegated to sit, sort and shred at Grandma’s house with David, Dave and Laura bringing me boxes to “quick sort.” Quick sort is if I thought “maybe” put it in my box to take home, no reading, no reminiscing. We were all traveling a good distance on weekends to do the clean out and time really was an issue. Well, it ended up being BOXES, not box, with David asking a few times, “Where are we going to put this stuff?” Well, for the most part that answer was the upstairs office and the kitchen annex. I chose to reclaim the kitchen annex first since it’s on the main living level of the house.

I started cleaning Tuesday and I’ve gone through 4 of the boxes from Grandma's house as well as half the cupboards in the annex. I was telling my Dad last night that it would have taken the 10 years ago Nani about three days to finish the annex but the mobility-challenged Nani of today is thinking 2-3 weeks. I may need chairs and help lifting the heavier things, but I have the necessary drive to achieve! I just have to make sure I employ the necessary brains to take breaks.

Today I have a treasure box to share for Vintage Thingie Thursday!

It’s such a pretty little cardboard box. The edges are definitely worn and no question it’s old. I don’t remember seeing this at Grandma’s house, but I’m sure I was the one who decided it should come home with me because I don’t know that Dave would have just assumed I wanted it, he might have, but neither David nor Laura would know the significance of what was written inside.

The name written on the side and in the box is “Opal Pugh.” Dave would have known that was our Great Grandmother, with whom I was very close. She was born in Sutton, West Virginia, in 1906 and was only Opal Pugh for 16 years. She married by Great Grandfather in 1922. But that’s not Mums’ handwriting and the crayon markings under her name make me believe it might have been a trinket box from when she was little. Tori and Rina had trinket boxes that I gave them to have at our house when they were little. It was someplace to keep little things they collected, rocks, prizes form cereal, those kinds of easily lost things. Maybe this was a box like that for Mums.

When I opened the box this is what I saw

There is a crocheted hat pin cushion,

Crocheted string pincushion

a beautiful white silk handkerchief with royal purple trim

Silk handkerchief, SO soft!

and a crocheted band in variegated oranges. The band might have been a choker, which was a common accessory at the time, but there isn’t anything to close it. That closure may be something that fell off.

Crocheted string, maybe a choker?

So the box itself is at least 90 years old, but I think closer to 100. My Great Grandmother would have been 105 last month, she’ll have been gone 10 years in July. The items inside could have been put there at any time, but I’d guess the things were probably put in it maybe sometime around Grandma’s birth in 1925. It’s a guess, but that handkerchief is the softest and finest silk I’ve ever laid hands on!

Thanks for joining me in my treasures and guesses today!

See more vintage treasures at The Coloradolady, where Suzanne hosts Vintage Thingie Thursday every week!

Photo-Thank-You-blog Wednesday

2012-01-04T22:49:00.003-05:00

Handmade coaster set from Flora

Sorry I’m posting late today! There are lots of times that I’m late with posting, usually because there is something going on in….non-cyber world. I simply can’t distinguish the two by calling one “real world.” I’ve exchanged cards, letters and tokens with people I’ve never shaken hands with. You are all real! We don’t touch each other’s hands, but we definitely touch each other’s hearts!

Okay, the photo, speaking of hands and hearts. Remember way back on December 7 when I told everyone reading about Flora’s Coasters that she made for Christmas guests at her home? Remember how I said she was giving a set away to one random reader? Well I was the lucky reader! Mr. Random was very kind to me. After receiving the note from Flora that I’d won, I sent my address info.

Now, you know from what I said about the sweet coaster sets that if I won it wasn’t going to be a gift to give, I consider these sweet coasters a gift from Flora to me! They arrived on Christmas Eve, totally like a present. I would have blogged about them sooner, but last week was pretty full with Rina here and I wanted to have a few minutes to tell you all about them properly!

Flora was modest when she called it a simple idea. The craftsmanship is superb! I got the very set she used in the step-by-step in her blog, or it was an identical set. They are beautiful and they’re green! That matches my eyes, my sweater, the colors in my future dream kitchen, my name ornament in our Christmas decorations…I just like green a LOT and being green only adds to how special the coasters are!

So, thank you Random for picking me and especially thank you Flora for sharing a great idea and so generously offering a set of the coasters to your readers!

Links
Flora's Blog, This and That

I’ve Been Tagged!

2012-01-02T23:41:00.006-05:00

I have been tagged by Glo at Glo Sews. Her blog is filled with so many craft and sewing ideas that range from quick and simple to detailed and inspiring and lots of fun reading in between!

This is a long meme, but maybe it might be a good way to keep your mind off food, cigarettes, Pepsi or anything you want to keep your mind and hands off this resolution season!

The Tagged Rules are as follows:

1. Post these rules.
2. You must post 11 random things yourself.
3. Answer the questions the tagger set for you in their post.
4. Create 11 new questions for the people you tag to answer.
5. Go to their blog and tell them that you've tagged them.
6. No stuff in the tagging section about you are tagged if you are reading this.’ Blah blah blah, you legitimately have to tag 11 peeps!

11 random things about me:

1. I’m a mature control-freak. I control by strategic delegation now.

2. I’m an advertising fan, not just the antique paper ads, which I truly love, but Twitter is my favorite social networking site because I get to interact with my favorite products' marketing departments.

3. Degrassi is my favorite non-sports TV show. I’m part of that secondary invisible market for the teen soap – I’m not the only mom-aged regular, not by a long shot!

4. I have a Spotted Elephant bobble head, misfit toy from Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer that sits on our games shelf all year long. I have no idea why anyone would ever turn down a pink and red stuffed spotted elephant. He’s always been my favorite Misfit Toy!

5. I wanted to move to Atlanta in the 1990s. I thought I was going to adopt the Braves as my baseball team, bought gear and everything, until the Braves and Reds faced each other in the 1995 NLCS. Expecting it to be easy to cheer for my “new” team and hard as I tried, I couldn’t cheer against the team I’d loved since I hoped for Al Kaline and Pete Rose when I bought baseball cards as a kid. My teams have always been and I know will always be the Tigers and Reds.

6. I don’t care where we celebrate on December 31, 2019, I MUST have the Number glasses – I want 20/20 vision!

7. Rina’s been here for a week and I wish I could figure out a way to keep her. Kids just get cooler and cooler every year and I love teenagers!

8. Je parle un peu de francais (seulement un peu!)

9. As much as I love Marketing, I kind defy it. There is quite a lot of rap that I like. I can even ignore some of the language because I love the music and the rhythm. Favorites include Ludacris and Drake.

10. My favorite composers are Tchaikovsky, Grieg and Rimsky-Korsakov, and yes, I listen to them often too.

11. I don’t care for Progresso soup. I think it tastes too canned and refer to it a “Progrosso.”

My questions from Glo:

1. Do you know how to sew? Yep! I sewed most of my wardrobe in the 80s. Didn’t have time to sew when I married my career. Now I don’t have a machine, but I can repair things and replace buttons.

2. Do you go to the movies or wait for the DVD? I go to movies once a year, maybe, but I really don’t watch them a lot. Also if I hear a book is great and being made into a movie, I prefer to see the movie first. I’d rather not say “The movie was a disappointment because the book was better.” I’d much rather say, “The movie was great and the book was even better!”

3. What was your favorite gift you received this Holiday Season? My new Keurig brewer and all the wonderful coffees!

4. If someone was going to prepare your favorite meal, what would it be? Just one? I cook and enjoy cooking, so I’ll say that my favorite meal that I don’t cook myself with ancestral secrets is Middle Eastern. I love mjadras and chicken galaba

5. How many brothers and/or sisters do you have? I have one brother by blood relation and 3 best friends that are like siblings to me, a sister, Kelly and 2 brothers Scotty and John. John passed in 2009.

6. Do you live in a small or large city and do you like it? I live in the most awesome city! Toledo is just large enough to have an arena, sports teams, although minor league baseball and hockey but it’s small enough that traffic isn’t terrible and things on the other side of town are not an hour drive away.

7. What is your fondest childhood memory? I have lots of good memories, but the ones I cherish the most are of my paternal grandfather. I was the oldest of his grandkids and the only one who remembers him. I was 6 when he died.

8. What is your first childhood memory? The oldest memory I have is a flavor and a sensation. No images and no language. The texture is sand and the flavor is lime. I had a bad habit of dipping lollipops in the sand. My mother told me the memory was probably at about a year old. I have a few episodic memories from my very early life.

9. Do you cook breakfast or just east something quick like cereal? It depends on the day and what the schedules are. Most often, I do cereal, fruit and yogurt and of course, coffee.

10. What, if any, resolutions have you made for the New Year? (See Projects and Goals post) I don’t do resolutions. I do goals and projects.

11. If you were going to write a book about your life, what would the title be? The Chronicles of Nani

Questions for those I have tagged:

1. How many times a week do you eat fast food?
2. How many pets do you have?
3. What is one expensive food that you enjoy?
4. Liquid indulgence – What’s your favorite alcoholic or caffeinated drink?
5. What did you do on New Year’s Eve this year?
6. What are 2 fruits that you always buy at the grocery store?
7. How many house plants do you have?
8. Dinner at home – at the table or in front of the TV?
9. What beverage do you drink the most in an average day?
10. How often do you play board games?
11. How many regular memes do you participate in on your blog?

My tags are:

I’m breaking the rules here. It took me 2 days of breaks to complete this. I know most of my readers here have jobs in or out of their homes and don’t require frequent breaks during cleaning or organizing to list and answer 22 things and think up 11 more. But if you have the time or if you are looking for a distraction to facilitate one of those types of resolutions I mentioned earlier in this post, I’d love to read yours! Leave a comment that you did it and I’ll visit your blog. If you want the short version, you can leave the answers to my questions in comments instead!

Links

Glo Sews

2012 Projects and Goals

First Barn of 2012

2012-01-02T22:43:00.006-05:00

This is the first Barn Charm of the year! So we'll start with yet another from the state that's the Barn Capital of the Nation!

West of Willard, Ohio, on April 21, 2011

I especially wanted to shoot this one for the Ohio State corn crib!

Join Tricia at Bluff Area Daily to see more fun, classic and intriguing barns in Barn Charm!

Monday Mug Shot

2012-01-02T09:36:00.002-05:00

Welcome 2012

Today’s mug is unpainted, a blank mug canvas, shiny and new. It’s the first cup of 2012! It’s awaiting me to paint it.

Looking at it from the front, it may appear to be empty. But it’s not at all empty. My 2012 cup is half full with the coffee I’d already brewed in 2011 and 40 some years before that. Truly, as early as 1966 I was already putting my own elixir in the baby bottle of life. Oh I started 1967 with a lot less in that bottle. I’d only had 5 months to work on it and I was drinking it all in and not saving much. It wasn’t until over a decade later that I really realized what an awesome drink that elixir was and started saving some of it through photos, crafts, my personal journal, recording the recipe. Of course then it was “expressing myself.” I didn’t have any idea that every thought, every action, every person who joined me or influenced me would be such an important part of who I’d be at 45. I didn’t realize that all those things that shaped my character, all those memories and the things I don’t remember would be the foundation for the vintage that fills my 2012 cup.

But that’s exactly what they are, everything that’s me is already in my cup. It’s half full with room for more. The collection of mugs in my memories is all about the choices I make and how I handle the outcome of those choices. I try to add things to my cup that will make that year’s vintage sweeter, more robust, better than every year before it, because that will be the base for next year’s drink. I want to toast the coming year with it and be excited knowing next year’s spices will make it even better, although I can’t imagine it tasting better. I want to savor and share from my cup of life and know that everyone who takes a sip finds a flavor they want to add to their own cup, just as I find a spice to add to mine when they offer a sip from theirs. My character and the influence of everyone who touches me make mine the perfect brew for me.

The mug for every year is unique, painted as I go with every nuance of the decoration on it being up to me. My cups are usually full of bright colors with not much empty space left by the time I’m finished. Yes, there will be a few dark spots. I try to paint the brightest colors I can near those, not to make them disappear, they are part of that year’s mug, but to show how small they are compared to the cheerier colors. Sometimes I paint outside the lines, get a dab of bright yellow just inside the cup or extra spring green on the handle. I’m quite sure that 1967 baby bottle, the first one I had a full year to paint, had giggly pink scribbles all over it. Every year I try to paint more happy colors than sad ones and I try to paint neatly in a grid to make my mug pretty. Somehow, that grid thing never happens! I’ll usually get a curve ball of some sort by the end of January and the perfect grid is gone. But somehow, even though the blueprint I set myself at the end of the year before wasn’t followed to the letter, the mug still looks good.

I want my cup of life to be one that always makes me smile and makes other feel good when they see it too. Just with the blueprint I have for 2012, even if it doesn’t go directly as planned, the mug will look great and the contents will be, as it always is, better and better every year.

2012 Projects and Goals

2011-12-31T00:02:00.002-05:00

It’s that time of year again. After a 2011 that saw many goals not obtained and many projects wanting for a slot in 2012, I’m really looking forward to the New Year and the opportunity to get back on track.

Now, in all fairness to 2011, it started with the MS symptoms getting worse and worse and me having no idea that my troubles were anything worse than needing to tweak my diet to improve the fatigue and probable back surgery to fix my mobility. My projects list centered on changing my food balance, recovery from surgery and more exercise. I had no idea that in May I still wouldn’t know what was wrong. I expected to be in recovery by then! As it worked out, the classes I’d planned to do in rehab were taken during the worst of the stress with all of this. I earned my first B and an incomplete that is now a D! It was not at all a time to try to learn a new computer language! I’ll be able to fix the D when I retake XML. It kinda sucks to not be on the Dean’s List for the first time since 1984!

All the medical and school stress had an adverse effect on my weight loss too. I lost 40 pounds in 2010 and felt ambitious about at least that much more in 2011. Humph. Did you know stress causes enzymes in your body to do weird things that actually hold on to fat? Imagine, the stress causes weight to fluctuate and even makes you gain despite a balanced, reduced calorie diet and exercise! Yeah and that causes more stress, which make weight loss even harder and you find yourself thinking seriously about a whole pint of Ben and Jerry’s with hot fudge and whipped cream but no cherry on top because you’ve decided that fruits and vegetables are mocking you.

No. I did NOT do that! But, maybe I thought about it once or twice this year!

The point is that while I was totally brain-muddled in a class I thought would be much easier for me, being shoved in an MRI tube three different times and tested for a possible brain tumor, my weight loss goals were not progressing. I lost 6 pounds in 2011, as of mid-December. I’ve probably gained that much back in the last 2 weeks of festiveness, but as is usually true with Januaries, I’ll shed that by the end of the month and start again, this year without the stress of the unknown or even school as I’ve taken the semester off.

So now, after getting myself organized with what’s wrong with me, what medications I need, a good diet and my physical therapy exercises. I’m ready to move forward…starting with looking back. I have some things from last year that were unfinished or left with alterations I have to put in place.

Updates from 2011 Projects and Goals

Medical Project

Last year the medical project was all about getting an MRI, surgery if needed, repairing myself physically. I wanted to get back to aquatic therapy!

Well, we know it wasn’t at all that simple! This year, now that I’m on a medication, checkup pending, that seems to really work for me, I’m medically concentrating on my therapy exercises, learning to use the AFO and shoring up some key places in our home with devices that will assist me. I’m specifically thinking of the hand shower David and I are installing in the shower in January, a wheeled cart for moving things around in the kitchen and boy, I’d love something secure to grab on at the top of the stairs. I know grabbing the window sill on the top stairs and the doorknob on the bottom ones is not really good for those pieces of hardware that aren’t made for lifting a person and if they give out that’s really unsafe for me.

In addition to the assistive devices and keeping up with my medications and vitamins, I want to do some research on other herbal and homeopathic things I can incorporate, like the turmeric and lemon tea, the taste of which I’ve really grown quite fond.

Weight Loss & Exercise Goal

My weight loss goal is pretty much the same as last year, but this year I WILL do it. I don’t blame myself for 2011 not being as successful as planned. I didn’t gain, I just didn’t lose much. Actually that’s okay. Remember I’d accepted that my face would hollow out and I’d look sick for a couple years. Well, losing as little as I did this year, my face has tightened back up from where it had been and I look better. (Score one for seeing the rainbow, not the rain there!)

So, I’m recommitting to my healthy diet after the holidays, just as last year, but knowing what challenges are before me and knowing what stress does helps me a ton! I’m going to incorporate meditation and relaxation time into my day, just a few minutes a day, but I’m going to reclaim essential mental balance. A lot of people will laugh at that because I work really hard to be mentally balanced, have since my early 20s! But the uncertainty prior to diagnosis was a fierce emotional toxin!

Exercise will be my therapy exercises and my stationary bike. It would be nice to think by late spring I’ll be able to either work on my upper body with the wheelchair or strong enough to walk short distance with the walker and AFO at the park. I’m going to let my physical therapist help me decide if and when that’s realistic.

Scrapbook Goals

Okay the goal last year was to keep up 2011 while finishing 2008 and keeping up on the project I was working on. The due date for the 2008 books was December 31, the 2011 books January 31 and I want that project done by February 29. 2008 is now the catch up goal for 2012. I got a good chunk of 2008 done, but only about half. I’m in June 2011. It’s not out of the question that I’ll finish by the end of January with a couple scrapping weekends, but I may realistically move that date back to the end of February. We’ll see where I am in a few weeks. The project is a gift and that is now the number one priority. I really can’t extend the finish date because it needs to be proofread and edited before it can be printed. Full disclosure and details on this MAJOR project will come after it’s given!

So 2012 scrapbook goals:

Priority Project complete and ready for proofreading February 29, 2012
2011 books completed with a flexible deadline of January 31, 2012
2008 books complete and ready to print December 31, 2012
2012 books completed January 31, 2013

House Uncluttered Project

This was an ambitious project to juggle in with classes and probable back surgery for just 2 rooms this year. It also ended up being an epic fail as a 2011 plan. The plan for 2012 is even bigger!

Knowing my limitations and requirements now, I’m a little more capable. That is lots of chairs, walkers and a telescoping feather duster will allow me to do more. Taking the semester off from school is Multigoaling! I’m going to start with the atrium off the kitchen where many of my boxes from Grandma's house are still stacked. I have a vision of at least one shelving unit for easy access of the modern kitchen appliances that were never that abundant in the 1950s. David and I were also discussing baskets for the K-Cups instead of stacked open boxes on top of the bread box.

From that room I’ll move out to finish the main level of the house, including some handicap access updates. I’m hoping that can be completed by the end of February. Remember I can’t do a physical 8 hours a day and anything that includes moving big things or heavy boxes will wait until David comes home.

It’s a lot, yet I don’t think I’m setting up any unrealistic ideas for myself. And for the physical work, the psychological rewards will be huge on many levels!

New Goals for 2012

Blog Goals

The big goal for the Chronicles of Nani has already started. I wanted to commit more to my regular blog features and add a few. I wanted to commit some time every day I post a blog to reading blogs and commenting. Call it corporate citizenship. I want to really appreciate those who stop by my cyber coffee shop. I’ve been doing well at keeping The Chronicles up and I’ve really been enjoying making friends and being a bigger part of the cyber community. I guess my blog goal is to continue what I’ve been doing, try to offer at least one digital scrapbook freebie a month and encourage everyone to get me those Friday By Request ideas!

Employment Goal

This is a biggie! I need to get back to work, but it’s still an awful job market and now I am officially physically disabled. It’s without a doubt scary. The New York chapter of the National MS Society is hosting a series of teleconferences in the beginning of 2012 about looking for work and having MS. I’ve registered for all 6 teleconferences/webinars.

I hope to be newly resume-ed and ready to get back to applying by fall. But I truly have a lot to learn. For instance, and this is the scariest question for me, when do I disclose my disability? Should I be upfront about needing assistance or do I walk in “Surprise!” for an interview with the walker when they can’t legally throw me out and try to impress them to the point of forgetting about it? I will attend the conferences with my questions in hand!

So there are my personal projects and goals for 2012. As always, this or something better. Ambitious? Sure, but if I made it through 2011 and I can still smile, I can do ANYTHING!

Follow Friday Four Fill-In

2011-12-30T01:16:00.004-05:00

This is a blog meme I did for the first time a couple weeks ago, really enjoyed it and enjoyed reading the other bloggers’ answers. It’s a quick way to check in with the regulars and meet the new readers at my Coffee Shop on the Information Superhighway. I follow Feeling Beachie so even on a busy Friday where I don’t necessarily have time to participate, I can still read along!

Definitely stop by and take a look at the many carried answers to the sometimes fun, sometimes thought provoking lines to complete.

This week’s statements:
1. Lately, I have been feeling a little___________
2. I am usually a ______
3. ________________________is always the best feeling at the end of the day
4. _________________________is the first thing I do in the morning

My answers:

Lately I’ve been feeling a little sluggish and excited. That’s this time of year for me. From the time baking starts to the end of the year I feel a little of that holiday stress. It’s the good kind of stress, exciting stress, but while I’m hustling and bustling to get things ready and get all the baking done, I’d have to say I eat poorly. I sample the baked goods, enjoy holiday candies and skip meals. Not the best way to feel full speed. Hard as I work to lose the other over 11 months, I gain a little and honestly, by the week in between Christmas and New Year’s Eve, I’m eating more veggies again and looking forward to getting back on track and tackling my new goals.

I am usually a planner. I was successful as a producer/project manager because I’ve always planned every detail from having my school clothes picked out before bed to my daily and hourly baking schedules for the holidays. The scariest thing in my married life is that I travel with my husband without an itinerary. I’d NEVER done that before I met David!

Snuggling under the quilts with David and the cats is always the best feeling at the end of the day.

Take my pills and vitamins and go downstairs for a cup of coffee is the first thing I do in the morning.

Come on and join the fun!

Well Hello Old Friend!

2011-12-29T17:00:00.002-05:00

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Slim-Fast for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

I’ll be posting my goals for 2012 soon and of course, reaffirming my weight loss goals will be among them, as always. I was checking out the Slim-Fast website. I used Slim Fast back round 1990, successfully; I dropped 15 pounds over the summer before trade school, including a week’s vacation! Back then it was a few flavors of powdered mix that you put in a shaker with water and ice to make the shakes. I tried the vanilla, but I pretty much got the chocolate most of the time. It was filling and tasty for 2 meals a day with healthy dinner. Boy Slim-Fast has grown while its customers have shrunk!
Now the plan has evolved to 6 meals a day, the Slim-Fast 3-2-1 plan. The plan is 3 healthy snacks which include fruits or veggies, nuts or a delicious 100-calorie Slim-Fast snack bar, tasty and new since I last tried Slim-Fast. The 2 is a shake, which comes in the powdered type and ready to drink shakes in vanilla and two chocolate flavors plus cappuccino and strawberry! And you’re not limited to drinking your meal replacement now. The 2 in 3-2-1 can be a meal replacement bar in any of several varieties of chocolate, sweet and salty and Fruit and Yogurt. The one is a balanced meal with meat or a vegetarian protein vegetables and a whole grain for about 500 calories.
Get your Slim-Fast meal replacements and snack bars the same places I used to get them, like Kroger or Target, but updating with the times, you can order online at Amazon or The Drug Store. Also moving with the convenience of the times and being part of social networking, you can follow Slim-Fast on Facebook and get information and support from fellow dieters who have had and are having success with the 3-2-1 program. I liked them and you should too if you want to be notified every time something wonderful, a new success happens!

Vintage Thingie Thursday

2011-12-29T00:31:00.004-05:00

As the year nears its end and we’ll soon be counting down the seconds until 2012, I thought it might be neat to share a beloved vintage timepiece!

This was one of the pieces I really liked from my great-grandmother’s treasures. I believe the watch-necklace is costume jewelry. I’ve seen very similar watch pendants from the late 20s and that does fit my great-grandmother’s style! Mums was always a bit of a fashionista, from her flapper-influenced look in the 20s to her 80s animal prints. She’s the one who told me, from my Sweet 16 on, numerous times, that I needed to leave the top couple buttons unbuttoned to “give the boys just a little something to think about.” So a young Opal answering “what time is it?” with “oh, I have the time right here” kinda fits. She was always a lady, but always a bit of a flirt too!

When it’s wound it keeps time for a few minutes, but it stops and starts with certain movements that I haven’t figured out why they make it start and stop again, but it’s still a beautiful pendant to wear. I wore the necklace to dinner for our anniversary this year and David noticed it and asked about it. That gave me a little chuckle. Mums was right. I married the boy and it still gives him something to think about!

See more vintage treasures at Vintage Thingie Thursday!

Photoblog Wednesday

2011-12-28T23:13:00.005-05:00

The Lights Before Christmas
Toledo Zoo

Anthony Wayne Trail Entrance to the Main Zoo

These were actually the lights after Christmas
Wednesday night, December 28, 2011, David, Rina and Nani.
It was cold, gorgeous and fun!

Fantasy Football

2011-12-28T23:07:00.001-05:00

Article written by guest blogger, Victor Flowers

My husband loves fantasy football. We have clear internet through http://clearwirelessinternetservice.com, and every Sunday he spends the whole day online, checking his fantasy football scores. While I give him a hard time about how much time he spends on fantasy football, I actually think it is pretty cool how close he and his high school buddies have stayed over the years. He still keeps in touch with the same group of seven guys that he went to high school with. Even in their mid-thirties, the guys get together every year for holiday parties and the fantasy football draft. Even though they are spread out all over the country, they will meet in a central location to have a guys’ weekend every year or two. It is really amazing the friendships that they have created over the years. Several of his close friends are in the military, but they guys will work around everyone’s schedule to make sure everyone can be there when they get together. I can honestly say that they are some of the closest friends I have ever seen. The wives have even become close over the years. It is a true blessing to have the lasting friendships that my husband has developed, even if it is aided by fantasy football.

Christmas For The Record

2011-12-27T21:03:00.007-05:00

First sleet, then snow, it’s a little foggy, slushy and there is slippy slush in the driveway and we were out in it. Winter, bleh.

But we’re home now and all is good! I have homemade peppermint mocha in a SpongeBob mug and Rina has a peppermint tea. It’s relax and play on the computer time. We braved the slush to go to our favorite Toledo Middle Eastern restaurant, Ya Halla and to ship a package she was sending to a friend.

Contrary to what this week’s Mug Shot may lead you to believe, this Christmas was not just about coffee! Since I had everything I’d want from the Eastern Market already, except hard candy peanuts, for which Tori and Rina searched but couldn’t find, I opted out of the trip thus year so I could finish some preparations at home. Rina was coming home with us after Christmas Eve dinner at, my cousin, Lisa’s place.

David and I met up with everyone at Dad’s first. We decided that, wince Lisa and her family had moved to closer to us instead of farther out from Dad, that we’d exchange our family gifts there first so we could leave for Toledo right from Lisa’s.

The highlight for me was Tori and Rina getting their ornaments. I grumble at myself because this year I didn’t get pictures. I need to start photographing everything before I wrap it so I can at least journal about it! In that pic above, taken by David, Tori is looking at me saying, “Oh Nana, thank you!” with a glassy eyes and a warm smile. I had ornaments done in their respective favorite colors with their names on them from Bronners, just like my Mom had done for them when they were born. They’d lost those ornaments in moving and really missed them. They came with ornament stands for four ornaments. I figured they can have them for their dorm desks next year with those ornaments from me with a special memory of their Grams with room for the ornaments I gave them last year and a couple of other special ones. Hopefully they’ll be inspiring reminders of how great they are while studying for exams before they come home for Christmas! David and I gave Dave and Laura a neon Tiki Bar sign for their entertainment room. I was happy to receive am electric cake pop maker! Rina and I had talked about trying it out this week, bu9t there are still so many8 sweets in the house! Cake pops together may be on a future visit.

Christmas morning was fun! It’s been just David and me as long as we’ve been together and this is our seventh Christmas. This year Rina was with us and it was so cool! I set up the breakfast tray and the fruit spears I made with chop sticks. Rina got a chuckle out of that. Then we opened stockings. It was fun putting stockings together for Rina and David!

Rina’s very warm fleece scarf

She also got a Wolf pendant that she’s worn every day since she got it. (Proud of herself auntie!) David had a very digital Christmas as he courageously embarks on the journey from film to digital!

Of course he’ll need flash drives to bring his “slides” to railfan gatherings!

This one is the first of his 12 steps. Understanding where his film went! The flash drives made with old film canisters were so cool

The flash drives as well as a cup that looks enough like a Cannon lens to be confusing, were all from Photo Jojo. They have a plethora of useful and whimsical gadgets for photographers. I loved shopping that site for him. (Edna, if you haven’t been. you should check out the site! He also got a card for his digital camera and a card reader so his computer can talk with the cards.

For his big present he got the slide scanner he’d asked for. Now is time to start scanning a couple decades of slides! I see, for my holiday efforts, a number of nights in the near future of frustration helping him learn all the new toys, but I’m confident that it’ll be totally worth it when he produces his first digital train sound and photo show!

I hope you all had as Merry a Christmas as we did!

Barn Charm

I’m not leaving you all on a Tuesday without a barn!

This pic was taken on December 18, just north of Dexter Michigan the way to a Christmas party. I saw it and said, “Ooo, gray barn! Stop!” The sun was hitting it just right and in addition to “gray barn” I like the stone base. It’s just a sweet shot!

Okay, games time with David and Rina starts soon, so I’m off to continue to enjoy my Sweetie’s visit!

Links

Photo Jojo

Monday Mug Shot

2011-12-26T23:18:00.004-05:00

SpongeBob Squarepants

It was a very coffee Christmas in Naniland! My surprise gifts from my cousin were just the start of something…something truly inspired and caffeinated!

Okay, technically, the SpongeBob mugs aren’t coffee mugs. They came with packets of hot chocolate. Believe it or not, they are marketed for kids! I’m a SpongeBob fan. I even watch it when there are no kids around. I credit Tori and Rina for introducing me when they were little. Much in the Bugs Bunny spirit, SpongeBob Squarepants is written on 2 levels, for the kids and their parents. There are so many references and musical moments tipping their hats to the 80s that a parent of kids in the 90s can’t help but laugh along. That includes an actively participating aunt of kids born in 1994! So when David saw the SpongeBob mug set sitting next to the Disney Princess set he picked out for JP, he picked it up for me. I’m guessing that he bought them at the same time because going back to a store a second time is so NOT a guy thing.

A week after my surprise K-Cups from my Cuz, we hosted UNO and the Fabulous Dessert Bar. Sheri brought me the sweetest gift basket! Now, she had not read my blog about the difference between a coffee gift from a man and a coffee gift from a woman, but she gave me a half pound bag of Starbucks Christmas Blend with a few packages of cookies to go with, which included a Caramel Macchiato Biscotti that was heavenly, and a wonderfully aromatic rosemary “tree.”

Sheri apologized because she’d forgotten about me having the Keurig Brewer, but I’d told her it was fine because Starbucks Christmas Blend is a holiday favorite of mine that doesn’t come in K-Cups and I could use my My K-Cup adapter to make Christmas Blend cups. When I posted pictures from UNO on Facebook, she apologized again about not getting K-Cups, an unnecessary apology because I am SO glad to have my Starbucks Holiday Blend, but even more unnecessary with the reply I gave to her comment. “And then the Keurig died, so you kinda saved Christmas. ”

It’s true! On December 19, the Keurig was acting up. It was only brewing a half a cup of coffee. I went to the help page to troubleshoot. I descaled it, running undiluted vinegar through it, a few times, still a half cup of vinegar. Then I went through the steps for unclogging the spout where the coffee comes out. Now it wouldn’t stay closed. When I did coax it to staying closed, the first time it still only brewed a half cup. I brushed the exit spout again. This time it stayed closed but as the water was heating, it popped open with a force that made me jump. The coffee pot that I considered our best wedding gift died less than 4 days before our third anniversary.

I was looking for a new Keurig maker as soon as the final drip fell from the old maker. I mean, never having stale coffee, a great variety, not overdoing the caffeine and the fact that from when we got it, the maker lived 2-1/2 years of everyday use with moving parts that are moved quite a bit by human hands for every cup, it really was quite durable and the coffee that wasn’t wasted alone paid for the extra cost of the portion packs. I chose the Keurig Elite, which is a small upgrade from what we had. The old pot was a B30, a single cup at a time pot that required a water refill for each cup. The elite was a little more expensive than the original price on the old brewer, but not much and it has a water reservoir so you can make one cup right after another without adding water. The reviews on it are great. I don’t buy for myself at this time of year, well maybe now after Christmas, but I figured I’d be able to use my coffee bucks, that is the coffee fund I save from my blog sponsor earnings, to buy the Elite by the end of January. I haven’t made an 11th Street Coffee purchase in a few months, so I’m not far from affording the Elite!

A friend suggested on Twitter that I could “ask Santa Dave” for the coffee maker. But I’d already asked for a wand scanner for scrapbooking and truth be told, I wouldn’t buy myself the wand scanner, not right away, because it’s a want not a need. Yeah, coffee is a NEED! I told David that too.

Working my way up to Christmas Eve I’d made a pot of coffee on Wednesday and kept it in the thermos carafe. The second day it was warm and I nuked a cup to get it hot. Friday it was cold and I nuked the last cup. Dilemma: Christmas Eve morning coffee. I can make a pot of the Christmas Blend, but then we’re reheating day old coffee on Christmas morning, or I can go without and make fresh for Christmas. David’s answer? “This is too big to wrap, so you get it early.” MY new Keurig Elite! On Christmas morning, I got my bag of Verona and 2 boxes of K-Cups from “Santa Dave” too! It was a Joyously Java Christmas indeed!

By the way, David and I are going out to pick out the rest of the main gift, probably in January my wand scanner! Remember what I said about giving and receiving? I’m spoiled generous!

The Davinities Bakery is Closed

2011-12-22T17:15:00.005-05:00

Crostada Due

With 2-1/2 dozen Chocolate Chunk Hazelnut cookies and 6 crostadas yesterday, the baking is done. I did all 6 crostadas as “Crostada Due” (pronounced /DOO-ay/) Due is Italian for the number 2. Each crostada has 2 flavors of jam, including two Simply Fruit crostadas that are black cherry-apricot.

The last of David’s gifts got here today and I can’t wait for him to open them. They are TOO COOL! I’ll post pictures some time after Christmas. I regret that I couldn’t link up the place for shopping, but they are backordered on almost everything, so I didn’t hurt their business. We all have other gift-giving occasions that a link later will still be handy!

While we’re talking about gift, I want to give Edna a warm thank you at The Chronicles of Nani! Edna sent the sweetest steam train salt and pepper shakers and one of her calendars. The salt and pepper shakers are from Ludington, Michigan, they say so on top.

Thank you, Edna!

I never thought I’d get one of the calendars Edna was talking about on her blog. I don’t hide the fact that I love her photography. She does incredible wildlife and nature photos and her signature shot is catching the rain or dewdrops on flowers, just stunning work!

Vintage Thingie Thursday

Time to make Krisp Kringles again!

I have a couple of kitchen items today. Now these are “in my lifetime” and I’m not quite vintage yet, but they are appropriate for the last Vintage Thingy Thursday before Christmas.

First is this Christmas tray. It’s from the late 70’s. I remember that we got a few trays like this just after we moved to Northville.

The second item is actually just a tad older than me.

The double boiler is part of the pots and pans set my parents received as a wedding gift. It’s also the double boiler that melted the peanut butter and butterscotch for the very first Davinity in 1973, when I was 7. In the recipe book, they were then called Scotch Krispies. They got their renaming at the same time I created the first Davinities logo, in my early 20s.

When Mom got her first set of non-stick pots, in the 80s some time, she was going to get rid of the double boiler. It had that dent in it then and the new pans had a double boiler. I asked her if I could have the old double boiler. It was the double boiler I always made Dad’s candy in. The double boiler had a spot in the pantry and from then on came out only once a year to make Krisp Kringles. It lives in the back of our pots and pans cupboard under the range now and it still makes the candies I made for Pop, the very first Davinity. When the doubleboiler comes out, Christmas season is official!

See more cool vintage treasures at Colorado Lady’s Vintage Thingie Thursday

Wishing everyone a very happy holiday season and A Merry Christmas to everyone who will be celebrating with me this weekend.

Photoblog Wednesday

2011-12-21T06:05:00.001-05:00

Tori, Christmas Eve 2000

This is the other half of last week's Photoblog. I'm telling ya, they really are twins. Tori's just always been older than her age!

Tori wanted "something different" for her hair. She's always been on top of trends, yes, even at six years old. She wanted the Topsy Tail style like she'd seen on TV. I didn't have a Topsy Tail but that didn't matter. She had a "Nana can make it work" attitude when she wanted something fashionable we didn't have. She often gave me challenges, but this one wasn't so bad. I got pipe cleaners out of the craft cabinet and made our own Topsy Tail!

She screeched a couple times because it pulled and I told her if it hurts we can do a different style, but she insisted that it would be worth it. After getting the tail right, we curled a few wispy tendrils and our young diva was ready for her shoot in front of the family tree.

The Tuesday Editions

2011-12-20T11:27:00.005-05:00

Yesterday was a very busy. Remember I said some time last week that that was the busy week and I’d be able to take it a bit easier this week? Yeah, right who am I kidding?

Part of it is my own greatness. Hehehe… This has been just a bumper-crop year at the Davinities cookie farm! When the cookie trays came out Saturday they went fast! I had to refill from the trays of extras in the kitchen! And I have to agree that the cookies did turn out really tasty this year. I had made “favors,” cookie bags to take home, for everyone and they were all were quite eager to make sure they grabbed their bag before they left. That makes me so happy!

I was a little shy on my normal amount of fine chocolates for the party this year, but the cookies actually went in more abundance. After restocking the party trays, it leaves me a little shy for Christmas, so I’m fortifying my resources! The Chewy Black Forest was a large batch, so I don’t need to make more of those, same with the Almond Sugar Cookies, but the Mr. Goodcookies and especially the Chocolate Chunk Hazelnut and Gingerbread are completely gone.

Now I will make a point of making sure it’s known that David ate the last Chocolate Chunk Hazelnut and I ate the last Gingerbread cookie yesterday. So, I did NOT run out of anything at the party. My Noni would be sitting next to me with that tilted hand accenting every word, half in Italian. It would not be a friendly Heavenly visit! A host running out of something their guests are enjoying is a mortal sin!

So today’s original schedule, which was one Loaded Loaf and finish the wrapping, is now a Loaded Loaf and Gingerbread cookies and finish wrapping. The Chocolate Chunk Hazelnuts are added to Crostadas tomorrow. I still have about 8 Mr. Goodcookies left and I’ll use half on the tray for home and the rest on the tray I take to Pop’s Christmas Eve. I’m still trying to not have any baking left on Thursday. We’ll see what happens there. David is working Friday night, our anniversary, so we’re doing dinner the night before. No gripes about him working that night. He worked the night shift the day we got married too, so it’s kinda romantic that he’s working!

Meet Me On Monday on Tuesday

Yesterday's busy was just enough that I didn’t get all my regular Monday blogging stuff done. It happens sometimes and by the time I got groceries and couple more little stocking things done and, well, I was beat! David and I went out and got our ham for Christmas last night and the scooters at the Andersons were all charging. I know from shopping earlier that yesterday was a busy grocery day. So we took out the wheelchair and used that. Even with David pushing a good part of the time, my arms were in the “falling off” mode!

But, a day late and a candy cane short (because I ate it) here’s Meet Me On Monday!

Every Monday Java at Never Growing Old gives us 5 questions to get to know each other better. Well, since the next two Mondays will not have MMOM questions because of the holidays the next 2 Sundays, we have 15 questions, to fill in for those weeks. The theme is Christmas Prep!

This Week’s Questions:

1.Wrapping paper or gift bags? I like gift bags, but I usually don’t have tissue paper, so most of the time I wrap.

2. Real or artificial tree? Artificial.

3. When do you put your tree up? I used to do all my decorating the day after Thanksgiving or the day after I got home when we started going to Grandma’s. Now it's when David and I can coordinate schedules.

4. When do you take your tree down? After Epiphany, January 6. David and I were both raised recognizing when the Wise Men got there. My Mom set up her Nativity with the Wise Men far away from the stable and after Christmas Day began to move them a little closer every day

5. Do you like eggnog? Yes I do and so does Rina, so I made sure to get some when I did the groceries yesterday.

6. Do you have a nativity scene?
I got the stable and holy family in my Nativity when I was 21. It’s Fontanini and I love the Old Italian look. I’ve collected other pieces bit by bit. In addition to Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus, I have the animals, Wise Men, several shepherds and shepherdesses with sheep and a sheep dog, villagers, musicians and barn cats. A certain orange house cat has gotten much better about staying out of the Nativity.

Baby Kaline just wanted to nap with Baby Jesus?

7. Favorite Christmas Movie? Early in the season, Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer, and near or on Christmas, It’s A Wonderful Life

8. Favorite Christmas cookie? This year, all of them! (very proud!) But I most pleased with having found and tweaked the perfect gingerbread recipe for which I’ve been searching about ten years! I’ve always bought gingerbread because mine just wasn’t good enough. This year, I’m making more gingerbread!

9. Where will you eat Christmas dinner? David, Rina and I will have Honey Baked Ham in Toledo. Our big family dinner is Christmas Eve at my cousin’s. It’s a traditional fish dinner, mostly fried. I’ll enjoy the family at that meal, the food at home on Christmas.

10. Angel, bow or star on top of your tree? Angel. I bought that angel when I bought the first Fontanini pieces.

11. Most annoying thing about this time of the year? That fried fish dinner?

12. Do you like Fruitcake? Traditional fruit cake, no. I have tried some variations that have been good and I loved the Celebration Generation fruit cake cookies! I have the recipe for those too!

13. What are you most excited about the holidays? This year, I’m totally geeked that Rina will be with us on Christmas Day. David is fine with some of the traditions that I keep, but Rina "gets" them because she grew up with them too.

14. Do you open presents Christmas Eve or Christmas Morning? Christmas morning. As a kid it was always after church, which meant the first place Dave and I went after midnight mass was to see if Santa had stopped while we were in church. He never did. We figured maybe he went in alphabetical order and Southgate was pretty far down on the list.

15. Will you still be wrapping presents on Christmas Eve? I want to say “I hope not,” but if something jumps out at me and says, “Just one more, I’d be a great stocking topper,” I’ll end up wrapping Christmas Eve.

See more Meet Me On Mondays and maybe even join in on the fun!

Barn Charm

In honor of the Christmas holiday, which will be past us by the next Barn Charm, I’m going a little off the strict interpretation of a barn because when I saw this I loved it!

These guys were hard at work on top of the entertainment center last weekend at a friend’s Christmas party.

The party was hosted by a friend of David’s, the host for train operating sessions with the group of guys he does model railroading with in Michigan. It was my first time meeting Mike, the host, and the rest of the guys. I was not the only wife there, but I may very well be the only wife who drooled over the CTC system he has in a control room upstairs. It's a vintage real deal that he has wired for his layout in the basement. The operating sessions are SO authentic. I told David I want one for our layout with a mug rack over it. Dispatching is a perfect job for someone who can’t do the standing. But I’d want less authentic video so I can see the trains too

For the barn purists, I also offer this one that we shot on the way to hockey last weekend in Connecticut:

There are lots of barns in the neighborhoods near Ben’s place. Some have been converted to garages or out buildings of that type, but a lot of the barns are kept up and are part of the beautiful antique homes.

See more barns this week at Tricia’s Barn Charm at Bluff Area Daily.

Monday Mug Shot

2011-12-19T18:25:00.003-05:00

It’s Crunch Time!

Doesn’t Christmas on the weekend make more stress? I don’t think it’s bad stress, it’s more that It energizes me and makes me relapse in my type-A-ness. But I’ve learned how to channel my type-A and just garb those reins when there is a project to be done. It took a long time to make myself learn that discipline!

This mug was Grandma’s. While she usually came to our house about two weeks before Christmas and stayed until New Year’s Day, going home after the`- celebrating in the new year, she drank her coffee from a Christmas cup all of December. I think that’s where Mom got the need for appropriate Christmas glassware and mugs from. I got it from both of them!

I inherited the type-A thing from Grandma too, to an extent. Grandma was one of the first women in management positions at the Kresge Corporation. She’d been the store manager at 2 different Kresges. Every year on Christmas Day, she had to take a break from the festivities to go check on the store, make sure all looked good and safe and the closed store was having a quiet Christmas. That’s dedication. But what I failed to realize, or to remember anyway, when I started my professional days was that when she did her store-check on Christmas, Papa always went with her and when she came back, she was all smiles and picked right up where she left off in bubbly conversations, games and nibbles. Her standard answer when someone asked her how the store was, “It’s still there,” and that was all she said about it. She was dedicated, but knew how to separate what you do for a living and what you do for a life. It took me a decade to figure that out and I never asked, maybe it did for her too, maybe that’s why she was offered the management positions first. The thing is she was great at balancing work, family and parenting before it was even a thought of being necessary for anyone! She could also in 2 hours every Wednesday, her day off and one that I spent with her in the summer a few times when I was little, she could vacuum and dust the house, do dishes and scrub things that needed scrubbed. She was the Energizer Bunny before anyone knew there was one too. Maybe she was the model for the advertising icon?

2009 was the last Christmas I had with Grandma. She was in assisted living, in the memory care wing. She was still very Grandma in that she seemed to forget the unpleasant things, but remembered the better things. She didn’t remember that Papa and my Mom had already gone. At Thanksgiving she asked if they were coming to dinner. Thankfully, she also thought we shouldn’t let dinner get cold and they could eat when they got there.

That last Christmas she asked me to bring her checkbook and buy her some Christmas cards so she could write her gift checks. I had closed her checking account and opened one local to me for her so I could pay her bills, I kept the old checks and kept the register up including the Social Security and pension deposits so she could see that the bills were paid and write the Christmas checks. I rewrote the checks from the actual account before giving them. She was mentally okay in remembering to whom she gave gifts and where she kept the record of how much. By about half way through her cards she began to get tired. That’s when she stated getting confused and we decided to finish the cards another day.

I tried to time my visits so I could spend a couple hours with her before the time of day where she got tired, but doing the Christmas cards tired her out quicker than when just talked. I still have the Christmas card that she made out for me. It’s signed on the wrong side of the card and her handwriting had gotten pretty sloppy, but it’s still a special treasure to me. That card, perhaps more than her mug, but the mug brings me back to the card, lets me relive the precious moments of my last Christmas as a granddaughter. It reminds me of how blessed I am to have started my life as a beloved granddaughter to four and held that title, beloved granddaughter, for 43 years. It’s through the holiday traditions and memories that the ones we love never really leave us, they’re never really far away.

Receiving – Almost As Good As Giving!

2011-12-17T14:27:00.003-05:00

I don’t mean that title in a corny or sarcastic way. I mean it quite sincerely. Receiving makes you feel loved. Giving makes you feel worth loving.

There is a way cool trend this holiday season at K-Mart stores all over. Strangers are paying off layaways! I think that is so cool! The USA story in links starts with a man with his three kids looking to pay a little on a layaway that he won’t be able to pay off and take home before Christmas. The assistant manager told him he couldn’t pay anything because she was paying it. The man was in tears when he realized she wasn’t joking. Anonymous donors are paying off layaways at K-Mart stores all over the country. How awesome!

I loved preparing my gift for the Secret Santa Soiree and the fun in sending it. I love sending gifts to friends I won’t see in person and I love baking my dozens of cookies for gifts and parties. Those are the things that make me feel truly happy. This past week has been the other side of that. This week, I’ve been the receiver!

Last night when David came in, he brought a box that was on the steps. It was from my Secret Santa!

Inside the box, there was another box, a beautiful box with a ribbon and a sparkly snowflake!

And inside that box was a box from Avon!

There was eau de partum spray, shower gel and lotion, a very nice set! I recall that I mentioned that nobody ever gives me things like that, so it was a very nice treat. I’m not familiar with the fragrance and burning the candle at both ends at this time of year gets me a little run down. My sense of smell, stuffed up, is the first thing to go, so it’ll be a few days before I get to truly appreciate that!

This was the real Secret Santa gift. At the end of last week, the day we left for Connecticut, I thought my Secret Santa Soirée gift had come in. There was a box, with my own address as the return address. Pretty sneaky! It also was addressed to Nani. I use my full name, so it matches the credit card, on orders that I buy for other people. If it’s addressed to Nani, it’s a gift for me rather than from me!

Inside the box was two packages in blue Santa paper I photoed everything so I could post it on my blog.

There wasn’t a card or any indication whom it was from. I opened the first box. Caribou K-Cups! I had just commented to David that very morning that we were almost out of unflavored coffee and I’d probably need to get some more at the store since I wasn’t planning on making an 11th Street Coffee order before the end of the year.

Box number two was more K-Cups! These ones were Green Mountain Nantucket Blend. The truth here is that I was going to buy Caribou to replenish our supply! Nantucket is a blend I tried and liked with the starter-pack that came with our brewer.

Still, cool a gift as it was, there was something not quite right. It just didn’t seem like a gift from a woman. Not that a woman wouldn’t give coffee as a gift, but if it was a gift of coffee from another woman, I’d think it might be one box of K-Cups with a mug or cookies. A man gives generous amounts of GOOD COFFEE and a woman gives a coffee experience.

So, I checked the return address again. When I first noted it, I commented, “Wow, small world! I have a cousin from that town!” Hmm… that cousin also happens to be a male cousin! So I hopped onto the email before publishing that my Secret Santa gift was here, likely confusing the real SS. He tried to deny it, but that darned honesty thing is a family trait.

So, I had 2 Secret Santas, one was my cousin who gave me serious coffee in blends I really like and the other, who is still unknown, who gave Avon, definitely a woman-given gift! I don’t have a lot of clues, but maybe I‘ll get some time to do some sleuthing.

Thank you so much to both of my awesome Secret Santas!

Links

K-Mart Secret Santas

See more Secret Santa reveals at Colorado Lady
Secret Santa Soirée *** means the reveal is posted

Friday By Fill-In

2011-12-16T11:28:00.005-05:00

I didn’t get a request for Friday By Request this week, so there isn’t one, but if anyone has a request for next week, by all means, send it in! Email me a topic, anything you want me to write about. I’ve had some pretty neat challenges over the years. I’ve done poetry, I was asked to write about how David and I met, I was asked what I’d change if I could change one thing in my life, David asked me to Photoshop Kaline's and Baggle’s heads on each other’s bodies and I’ve even rewritten hit song lyrics from the other gender’s point of view. You see, there is very little I won’t try in the way of a challenge! As the one who challenges me, I can link to your blog or you can remain anonymous. Just let me know what you’d prefer.

I’m actually finishing the busy week today. I’ll finish the baking, Almond Sugar Cookies, Krisp Kringles and Gingerbread cut-outs and David will get the tree up and we’ll add ornaments before he leaves for work, night shift tonight. Hey, that gives me some wrap-up time with the baking and maybe even a little bit of scrapping time!

Another plus – David made hot breakfast this morning! Eggs and scrapple. He stocked up on the scrapple that was his favorite growing up when we were East last weekend. I was prepared for a treat! He was so happy that I liked scrapple when I tried it and often told me Parks was the best, better than any brand I’d tried. He was SO right!

Now I’m all breakfasted up and ready for more baking. I made 9 dozen cookies yesterday and will probably make more than that today. I grouped things on purpose – the Krisp Kringles are super easy and fairly quick to make. Remember this is the original Davinity and I made them with only supervision from my Mom when I was seven years old. They were a lot harder to make then!

Before I head back to the kitchen, I was invited to check out the Friday Four Fill-In at Feeling Beachie in the comments at The Chronicles of Nani. It’s a quick and fun blog and I’m going to try it out. Here we go:

This week’s fill-ins –

1. ____ is my ideal winter night.
2. I don’t remember the last time I ___ but, I really want to.
3. I will never turn down __________
4. To save money I like to ____________

____ is my ideal winter night.

I think I experienced my ideal winter night in 2005. David was meeting me on the night before Thanksgiving to drive up to Grandma’s after he finished work. Dad and Aunt Judy were already there and Dad called to tell me to come up in the morning because the snow was so bad. When David got to my house, we started a fire in the fireplace and had ravioli, with my homemade sauce, and red wine sitting by the fire with the snow falling outside.

I don’t remember the last time I ___ but, I really want to.

Curled up on the couch with a big bowl of popcorn and watched Gone With The Wind from open to end. It’s my favorite movie and every now and then, ya just gotta, ya know?

I will never turn down __________

I’ll never turn down an opportunity to go to a baseball game, or anything baseball for that matter. Ever since I was a kid, if you want to sell me something, put a baseball on it. Seriously, I chewed Home Run gumballs because they had baseball terms on them and when they did hand dipped ice cream at Lugnuts games, even though there was chocolate, I always got “Batter Pecan” because of the baseball name. Put a baseball on it and I have to have it!

To save money I like to ____________

Choose restaurants that don’t serve liquor when I go out to eat with friends. A simple salad doubles in price if you can have a glass of wine with it.

Want more? Want to join in? Head on over to Feeling Beachie!

Beep-Poof-Woosh!

2011-12-15T17:34:00.000-05:00

Those are the sounds of the day here. Beep is the timer on the oven, Poof is what the cocoa did to me when I was making the Black Forest Cookie dough and Woosh is what the wind is doing outside. Right now, Huhhhhhhhh is the sound of me sighing, tired. I need to rest a bit before I put the Black Forest Cookies on the sheets for baking.

I’m a little behind, just a little. I need to finish clearing off the dining room table. I've been clearing a little bit of the buffet every break today. Now everything I had that needed put away on the buffet is on the table, en route to its destination. I haven’t started putting our cards up yet. They’re in one pile, still on the buffet. We display cards in 2 places, just as there are 2 different cards we send. We do a family card with pictures of us and the “kids” and a card with our best snowy train for our railfan friends. We don’t credit the photos because we use a snow shot from someplace we were together. But, this year the photo is mine from the show day in Indiana the last day of November! David is changing over from slides to digital now. It’s been my photo one other time and I think I should just gaze upon the card this year in all my ego’s glory. I fear that when David, with a much better camera and a much more able body to get the shot, will likely be the photographer from 2012 on. But I’ll still be there for every Christmas card shot!

The closet door at the base of the stairs is where we display the train cards and those ones stay up until the next Christmas, all train photos from our friends. It’s neat door wallpaper! The other non-train cards and photo cards go on the French doors in the dining room. They stay up until mid-January and are the last Christmas decoration to come down.

I LOVE cards! I keep them, thinking, remembering, the people who sent them. I have birthday cards, valentines, graduation cards and some sweet “just because” cards in my cedar chest along with all those Christmas cards. When all is said and done, those are my certificates for my stocks, the investments that have the greatest value in my world, the people who make it a great one to live in!

Chocolate Chunk Hazelnut Cookies

I’ve finished the Mr. Goodcookies and the Chocolate Chunk Hazelnut cookies. I know I was going to come up with a pretentious Euro-sounding name, but David said “Just call them Chocolate Chunk Hazelnut!” Since I created them for him, I guess I ought to go with what he wants to call them. Now there’s a bowl of Black Forest Cookie dough in the kitchen which I’ll bake as soon as I post this. I’d wanted, planned, to have the Loaded Loaf done by dinnertime too, but it looks like that will wait until after dinner. David worked early, so he may be home early and I want counter space for spaghetti making.

Kitchen Sink Cookies

It seems the Davinities Test Kitchen is always open. After I made a couple dozen Goodcookies I had about three, maybe four left in dough. I had about five left in the hazelnut. I already had 5 dozen cookies made, so rather than baking a half and half pan, I made half and half cookies! I mixed the 2 pieces of dough together and threw in some raisins. YUM! That’s not going to become a holiday Davinity. It made 8 cookies with semisweet and milk chocolate, hazelnuts, peanuts and raisins. It’s possible that’s combination only a Nani would love, but love it I do!

Okay, back to the kitchen. I have back forest cookies to bake, spaghetti to make and then a Loaded Loaf before the night is over. I also want my Nativity up before bed!

Vintage Cookies

2011-12-15T15:08:00.002-05:00

Here is my, very personally topical, offering for Vintage Thingie Thursday.

These might be older than me. I don’t know if they were something my Mom had when she was younger or if it was something she bought after she got married. I suspect it was the former since I don’t ever remember them not being in the house I lived in. I also have no memory of them ever looking new. They are the card suits. I don’t know what happened to the club, but I do remember eating cookies shaped like clubs when I was little!

Now back to 2011 baking!

See more vintage things!

On Schedule So Far

2011-12-15T12:25:00.004-05:00

I was up at 6:30 this morning. My alarm is set for 7:05, but I almost always wake up before it goes off. That’s not a bad thing since David sleeps later and it means the alarm, which is on my phone, leaves the room with me before it goes off and wakes him. Today he was out early for a work meeting anyway, but I do try to think of him!

The first thing I did was take the butter out of the fridge to soften. That was the first thing on my “to do” list. The second thing wasn’t as successful. I had a couple bakery calls to make. My Mom used to have fabulous breakfast trays on Christmas Morning that everyone munched on while we opened presents. Remember I told you about Mom and Christmas? Opening presents on Christmas morning was a few hours! Pop put the Yule Log in the fireplace and started the fire. I put the video fireplace on. The video fire was no competition for the real thing, but the music was great Christmas music and it set the mood well!

Then everyone else trickled in. At different point in my life it was a different cast. When Dave and I were the kids for whom the lion’s share of Mom’s Christmas Mountain was there, Grandma and Papa would drive in to Southgate from their home in Detroit. That included more huge sacks for Grandma’s only child, her spouse and her only 2 grandkids! After we moved to Northville, Grandma and Papa would stay at Mums’ house and the three of them came over. The traditions have changed, some slightly, some a lot. They grew and accommodated as our family changed.

Christmas for eight, Mom-style

When we had new twin girls in the family, Mom made a new stocking. Rina, who is 2 minutes older, got her Dad’s huge stocking and Tori had a new one made for her. The huge stockings really weren’t discernible from each other. Mom still did my huge stocking because I didn’t have kids of my own. Boy, she’d be buying LOTS of cat toys now! At the time when the girls came into our family, Papa had passed and Mums was in a senior assisted living apartment. So Grandma joined us from the downstairs bedroom.

Christmas 1996 - The first real excitement about Santa

In 1996, I worked for a company that did seminars for Fortune 1000 companies. I brought home leftovers from a fabulous breakfast sweets tray we’d had at the office from a company in Troy, Michigan, about an hour’s drive from us! Mom was so impressed she suggested taking a ride out on Saturday to see the bakery. 2 annual trips to Ridley's Café and Bakery became a new tradition. The first was just after Thanksgiving to have a wonderful lunch and order our breakfast for Christmas. The second was a stop on Christmas Eve afternoon to pick up that tray. We had a tray of mini muffins and pastries with small loaf slices and fruit-kabobs every year until 2003. Mom passed in 2003 and to be honest, I couldn’t afford to keep up the Ridley’s tradition.

Ridley’s Breakfast Tray

This year, Rina will be with us on Christmas Morning and I thought it would be neat to enjoy a tradition we both loved and be able to introduce it to David. The problem is that Ridley’s is just way too far now and I can’t find anyplace locally that does that kind of tray. One bakery does mini Danish, but not mini muffins, one has cookies and cupcakes, but not muffins. Since I have a much looser schedule next week, I think I’ll order the mini Danish, get the mini muffins from a different place and make a couple mini loaded loaves and assemble my own Christmas Morning breakfast tray. I’ll also go to the grocery Friday after David leaves for work and get the fruit to make fruit kabobs. I will make this work!

Okay, now break time is over! Mr. Goodcookies are done and the Hazelnut Chocolate Chunk cookies are waiting to be put in the oven! I’ll come back after lunch with my Vintage Baking Thingies and some cookie photos!

Links

Ridley's Bakery Cafe

Photoblog Wednesday

2011-12-14T13:53:00.005-05:00

Rina, Christmas Eve 2000

Rina told me she wanted to be "pretty, like a present" for Christmas Eve dinner at my cousin's house. What she meant was she wanted curly ribbon like the gifts I'd wrapped and on my tree. We did pony tails and matched ribbon to the decal on her jumper.

It was her idea to sit next to the tree for a picture. She was cuter than the presents she was sitting with!

Career-Driven Comfort

2011-12-14T12:19:00.002-05:00

This has been a year of seeing a lot of medical professionals for me and one thing I’ve often giggled about in my own mind is how great it must be to “wear pajamas” while making your living. By that I mean, of course, scrubs! http://www.blueskyscrubs.com is a great place to find scrubs for men, women and kids in a variety of colors. If you have a professional who wears scrubs on your holiday gift-giving list or if you want something comfy to wear on those days you stay in, Blue Sky Scrubs is certainly worth checking out!

Medical professionals that are just finishing school or starting out in their profession have college bills and need an appropriate career wardrobe, same as any profession. If you or someone you know needs scrubs as they are starting out in their medical career, Blue Sky’s discount scrubs are a good way to get that professional wardrobe started. The prices are great and if you spend $155, the shipping is free. You all know how much I love free shipping!

They offer full sets of scrubs, separates, scrubs hats in fun prints and accessories. Whether you want to feel good and confident at work or comfortable at home, Blue Sky Scrubs is a great site to see!

Home Again, Mug Shot, Barn Charm and Stuff

2011-12-13T21:21:00.006-05:00

Make sure you refill your coffee cup before reading. It's one of those longer post days!

It was a very nice long weekend in Connecticut. We chased a few trains ion Friday and then drove the rest or the way in to Ben and Ellen’s home for the weekend. I’ll talk some more about the weekend in the “Mug” feature in a moment.

Before I get into the Monday feature on Tuesday, after dark, I wanted to take a moment to talk about sponsors. It’s posted in the Chronicles of Nani Bulletin Board, the section before the blog entries, that I do some sponsored posts. I am selective about the sponsors for whom I write or “sell” a post to. Some of those sponsors use disclaimers before the post, others do not because I have put that disclaimer on the bulletin board. If I write a sponsored post it includes linked text. To retain that distinction, I don’t use linked text in my regular blogs, there is a link section at the end. I do that so you know that the post is for a sponsor. I like to be able to include a bit of me in my ads to show that I really do have a decent opinion about the sponsor.

The reason I bring this up is because, while I welcome comments on sponsored posts, I won’t publish ones that suggest a competitor or a “better way” to do something without using the sponsor. I don’t feel it’s ethical to accept compensation for the post and accept comments to the post that do not add to the positive suggestion or testimonial.

There was one recently that I could not in good conscience post, although the comment did not say anything bad about my sponsor and it was in no way a negative comment, it did offer a way to get the same results without use of the sponsor. I’m so sorry that I couldn’t post the comment to that sponsored post. If you do have an opinion that might not be the most positive one for a sponsored post, please, feel free to add it to a comment to the post that follows. I’ll post self-help suggestions, just not to the direct post for a sponsor. If someone searches the product and finds a link to The Chronicles of Nani, the post they read and its comment should reflect positively on the sponsor. That’s why they compensate for blog sponsorships.

There are many great things about coming home, even when you’re only gone for a few days. The first of those is seeing the kitty-kids Carla and Kaline were both happy to see us in that clingy Kaline follows her Mommy everywhere in the house and Carla follows Daddy. There was a box from Fine Foods International waiting for me, my order of Torrone and some other Italian things that I order every year with the Torrone for Christmas and 2 of the three hard persimmons I left on top of the apples before we left Thursday were soft and squishy! The third one is slightly squishy, but it wasn’t touching the apples as much as the other two. It’ll be ripe in a couple days.

That’s the thing with persimmons. They are delightfully sweet and tasty when ripe, but leave an awful fuzzy feeling on the roof of your mouth when not quite ripe. Pop complains because they throw out the persimmons at Meijer when they get soft, thinking them “bad.” That’s so sad! They ship when they are red but hard because if they picked them ripe, they would be bad by the time they got to market. That plus a ripe persimmon is very soft and puncturable. I don’t know what the thing about apples is with them, but to ripen a persimmon faster, surround it with apples. It really works! I ate one this afternoon and it was SOOO tasty and NO fuzzy mouth!

Tuesday Tazza Shot

From the Connecticut Cupboard

I love the assortment of mugs at Ben’s place. There are mugs for fun-sounding places that I haven’t been and pretty Christmas mugs that we had coffee in Sunday at brunch.

David and I got in after we’d stopped for a later dunch or linner Friday afternoon around 4. It’s starting to get dark by then in the east. We still were in Pennsylvania, so we still had New Jersey and the New York traffic to get through on our way. When we got in Ben and Ellen had gone to a parents meeting for high school girls hockey. Emma is a freshman on the Varsity team. How cool is that? Oh, if there had been girls ice hockey in school sports when I was growing up! My niece by marriage and I have a kindred connection with the ballet and hockey thing. It definitely makes me her fan!

But all three of the kids are into a lot. Nephew Ben is also on the high school hockey team and he referees to keep gas in his car. On Saturday we went to a preseason tournament for boys hockey and then went to a different rink for the first girls game of the season. I got to see Ben’s and Emma’s teams in one night.

Sunday we went to the early church service and David’s older brother, Peter met us at the church too. It was a big family event because JP was an angel, the angel that told the shepherds about the birth of Baby Jesus, in the church Christmas pageant. The kids did such a great job!

After church, David and I went out to meet our friend, Jim, at the train station. Jim was bringing a bag of model trains that David had ordered and it was an opportunity to shoot some commuter trains together for a little while before Jims return train was in and we had to get back for brunch. I’ll tell you, it was COLD! It was so cold that the metal parts of the wheelchair hurt to touch to make it move. I need to get some gripping driving gloves for winter. These are things you don’t necessarily think about until you’re suffering not having thought about them. Still, it’s worth a little icy metal on the hands to spend some time with a friend we don’t see often, especially when we had just a little time on that given day!

When we got in for brunch, that’s when I got to see the sweet holiday mugs. Ellen made a frittata with fresh basil that was incredible! I have noted since the first trip when we met that Ellen is an excellent cook. She’s been moving to a healthier repertoire and it still tastes phenomenal!

Then there was some time for magic. JP was at a birthday party and she and her Dad were going to be at a holiday gathering for a club be participates in. Ben is one of the leaders. I didn’t absorb all of the details, but the group is similar in organization and purpose to scouting. Ben has what I’m sure is an official Santa Suit because it transforms the wearer. Ben needed someone to don the suit for the girls and Peter volunteered. It was fun to watch as they put the suit on him as my brother in law transformed into the Jolly Old Elf. Every article of the costume brought a little more jolly and a little more bass in the “ho-ho-ho!” I’d love to see David put on the suit some time.

Now, we’re still on Sunday. I married into “Super Fam!” Hehe.

David and I went to another hockey game where we knew none of the players. Ben and Ben were both refereeing the game! It was the first time I’d ever really watched the referees. I’ll be honest, when a penalty was called I almost yelled, “Yay ref! Good call!”

At dinner we talked about Christmas gifts. David and I brought gifts and there were gifts for us and nothing was opened before we left Connecticut. It’s all “wait ‘til Christmas.” Emma and I are both of the mind that once a gift is given, you should open it, not make yourself crazy string at the package under the tree for days or weeks. No one was listening to us.

Sunday night, David went to watch his brother Ben play a hockey game. I stayed back, played a few games of Connect Four with JP. I’d played quite a bit of Connect Four with her this we4ekend and finally won a few games. I need to broaden what I see on the board, because she, the seasoned Connect Four veteran, was sneaking up and beating me when I thought I had her. After Ellen and JP went up to bed, Emma and I watched an episode of CSI, a show I enjoy, but really don’t make a point of watching. David and Ben came back in after the hockey game while I was finishing up Meet Me On Monday.

It was, as it usually is, a fast-paced but fun weekend with the East Coast family.

Barn Charm

The last note from the Connecticut weekend I’ll leave is this week’s barn.

The Christmas Barn in Wilton, Connecticut is a restored 1850’s barn in a cluster of restored antique buildings. It’s been a year-round Christmas store since 1990. David and I bought our 2006 ornament here.

See more barns at Bluff Area Daily!

Meet Me On Monday

2011-12-11T22:26:00.003-05:00

Welcome new week!

The next week will be intense, but I WILL survive it. In fact, I’ll sparkle at the end of it!

The Monday Mug Shot will be a day late this week. I’ll get through Meet Me On Monday without throwing the laptop through my brother-in-law’s window, but no guarantee if I try 2 posts in one night. I will NOT buy another laptop unless I get to sit down and type a blog or a homework assignment with it first. This Gateway has the worst keyboard in the world. Even David, who types for a living, typos because the keys are so awful when he’s used it. Nani will just say “no” to MOO! Grrr!!

A great idea, no, a GREAT for a Monday getaway day from a land where there are Dunkin Donuts a- plenty, is a stop for morning coffee and souvenir K-Cups! That’s our morning plan. I’ll tell more about the weekend in the mug shot Tuesday

So, without further ado, here’s my entry for Java’s Meet Me On Monday!

Questions:

1. Tomorrow I'm going to _________?
2. Pudding or Jello?
3. What book are you currently reading?
4. What is the first concert you went to see?
5. What is your current weather?

Tomorrow I'm going to _________?

Head home after a great long weekend with family,

Pudding or Jello?

Jello, but it’s a pain to make

What book are you currently reading?

I just, and I mean just, started Inmate 1577, Alan Jacobson’s latest Karen Vail novel

What is the first concert you went to see?

Kiss with Cheap Trick and New England at the Pontiac Silverdome, in Pontiac, MI, Friday, July 13, 1979.

What is your current weather?

It was brilliantly sunny but COLD all day. It’s dark and colder now!

Friday By Request

2011-12-09T08:00:00.002-05:00

This week’s request is from Seamhead Gypsy who sent this challenge:

Where or how does one know specific train schedules?

For about 2 years now I've been gathering ideas and trying to teach myself some of the nuances of model railroading. Thus far my only accomplishment was two years ago when I made a temporary setup under and around one of our Christmas trees. For me the fun was using the glue other materials to make the scenery where my little winter town was set. I tried (wanted) to do a polar express theme last year but never could find enough info to be authentic enough.

FBR is for me to continue to do research. I want to see the trains so I can be sure that I have the right details.

There are actually a few questions in there, but I’ll try to help!

The first thing I did was to ask my railfan guru, David, a few questions to make sure I have my facts right. (Always check your facts, then if you’re wrong, you can blame someone else!)

I sense that you want more the opportunity to see the detail on the trains for modeling as much as how they run, so I have some suggestions.

First off to see the trains in action, I’ll suggest find some local railfans and ask to hang out and observe when they chase trains. It worked for me. No, falling in love with them is NOT a requirement, especially if you are a married dude and most of them are married dudes. The whole romance of the rails thing works best if there are 2 single people who are mutually attracted anyway. But seriously, look for guys hanging out near the railroad crossing, the extra antenna on the car lets you know there’s a good chance it’s a railfan. Let them know you’re an aspiring model railroader and you are looking to learn.

If you don’t want to be so bold, try learning about signals. Get familiar with the railroad and get a feel for when the trains come by. There are great books and online resources for learning what the different signals mean. I’m still working on that. It’s not easy, but it’s easier than figuring out baseball signals!

When David and I got out, we use those things. He’s also on the phone all the time with other railfans, some who work for the railroad or for a shipper who works with the railroad. When a dispatcher has a minute and calls a friend to tell him where the train is, it’s NOT insider trading! The big companion when we chase trains is the scanner. The same way a scanner tuned to police radio can hear what’s going on, a railfan listening to railroad communication can figure out what crossing the train will be at next. Understanding the jargon can be challenging sometimes too!

If you are looking to see some trains up close to really see the detail, I recommend a train zoo! A train zoo is what I call a train museum. Rina started to enjoy trains seeing them up-close at The Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. There’s SO much to see there, including a few antique locomotives you can walk right up to and take photos. There are some train zoos that also have a train that runs, a tourist train. I know in Ohio there is the Ohio Railway Museum just north of Columbus in Worthington. They have a train that runs there for a reasonable admission, great for getting kids into the trains too! There are lots of train zoos in the US. Google “Railroad Museum” and the state where you’re looking to find one. There’s a good chance you might not have even known there was one near you.

The last thing I’ll suggest is seek out a local model railroad club or train hobby shop. Ask questions. Most railroad club members are passionate about their hobby and won’t take much prying to get them talking about it. I’ve always found that the best thing is, to humble yourself a little. If I say up front that I’m a novice who wants help, I find more often than not, I get help.

I hope that’s some decent information to get you moving in the right direction, Seamhead Gypsy. If you seek more, you can always drop me an email!

Next?

If you’d like to give me the next Friday By Request, send me an email! I’ll write about, photograph, scrap or do poetry or song lyrics. Think the idea is just too crazy? Send it to me. I might still be able to do something for you! The first person to send an email as of now will be next week’s Requester. You get to challenge me and a link to your blog if you want it. I hope you’ll join in!

Links
Ohio Railway Museum

Money, Money, Money, Muuunney!

2011-12-08T07:50:00.007-05:00

When we were getting Grandma’s place cleaned up and ready for sale, Dave walked in with boxes for packing things up. He gave me a couple of boxes. “Sis, we don’t want this to be a year-long project. If you want to go through anything, put it in your box and go through it at home."

Baby brother knows his big sister well. Actually, it was enough of a distance and coordinating our schedules was an issue, so we both took home few boxes to go through and shred/dispose of what was necessary each trip up to Mid-Michigan. Our rule was "if you find something you really want in the boxes you took home, keep it." We'd pull out anything we thought the other or the great-grands might want. Box other things for sale. I’m pretty proud to say that we did okay. Grandma left my brother and me as even heirs in her will. I’d heard horror stories about siblings and estates. We did really well sharing the burden, the responsibilities and the tangibles Grandma left.

I got the photos. I already had Noni’s photos and unofficially, I was the family historian. I also got all the coins because Grandma and I collected them together and she had stipulated that years before she passed. Laura spotted the metal box in things she was going through. Here is what it reads on the front:

That had to be from goggles Papa had in the navy. But it made a noise like small pieces of metal. Laura had brought it to me and told me I could open it just a sec, then put it in my box. After looking inside briefly and wide-eyed, I closed it and put it in my box, a box that’s been in the back room of my kitchen since about May 2010. I’d simply forgotten it in all the commotion of the cleaning and legal work we still had to do. This is what I saw for that brief moment at Grandma’s house:

Papa definitely brought it home from World War 2 with him. The denominations are mostly from Pacific area countries, the ones I could tell for sure.

These coins are the newest ones in the box, dated 1944:

With the exception of 1 2-lire bill from Italy, dated 1943...

The paper money was all undated.

This coin was the oldest in the box, 1881

There was a Philadelphia Rapid Transit Token, there's one for Minneapolis too.

And a couple of tokens I can’t quite find info for.

Kansas Sales Tax token?

And a “valuable token” from Kennedy Cutrate.

Anyone ever heard of these last two?

I think it’s fascinating that Papa brought home all those coins and well, he pretty much did the same thing I did. He put them away, probably to mess with later, and forgot them. Boy if that box could talk about Papa’s days as a sailor and how he spent his money on leave. Hmmm…

If anyone has any thoughts on those last two coins, I love to hear it!

In the meantime, I’m sharing through Colorado Lady’s Vintage Thingie Thursday.

With A Little Help From My Friends

2011-12-07T12:55:00.006-05:00

Yesterday was a very tiring, but very productive day. First was my hair appointment. After getting the kitchen shining on Monday, I deserved a little pampering. There’s nothing more comfortably social that chit chat with the stylist I’ve been with for the past 2-1/2 years. I had a stylist for many years back in Michigan, but she and I both moved out of state and she did not follow me to Ohio! Actually, she left before I did and I had many one-cut-stands, still not finding the one who I’d trust my hair with every time and even let them make suggestions.

I took a giant leap of faith in early 2009. I hadn’t had a cut in 2 years. That wasn’t the frustration of no stylist. That was me being all noble. My hair grows fast and I was growing it out to cut it short and donate the tail to Locks of Love. The Salon I go to, Camelot in Holland, OH, would send the pony tails to Locks of Love on my behalf. That’s how I met Jamie.

Jamie cut my hair into a cute short style after cutting three ponytails from it. Because of the way my hair was tapered, I had one ponytail that was about 13 inches in the middle and 2 almost 11 inch tails. The short style was cute and easy to take care of. It was shorter than I liked, but I needed pieces of at least 10 niches to donate. I’ve been seeing Jamie ever since. She does a great job and makes wonderful suggestions for flattering looks. Yesterday, after growing out my bangs to the stylish one-length that so many long-haired women wear for over a year, I had my bangs cut to the shorter length they had always been. I'm just not the constantly moving my hair from my face type! I think Jamie was as giddy as me with the results! No more straight hair in my face. I have bangs and the natural curl again! I also look a little younger than the 50 I’d been seeing in the mirror. (based on the change from 44 with bangs last year)

After the haircut, I had four boxes on my front porch! I still expect a few more things that I’ve ordered, three more boxes, but I now have all the parts of Kelly’s present so I can wrap that and send it on its way to Sikeston

I also got a present I bought for me:

YAY Spatulas!!

Yes, David laughed at me too. But the rubber scrapers we have had seen better days, especially the little one that I still used even after the top of it met with a disposal accident. These ones have heavy duty plastic handles and are very strong and supple. I used them yesterday and LOVED them!

Next it was on to loaves! I got the “Christmas Gift Loaf” recipe from reading Lynn’s blog, Cottage and Creek. She made “Holiday Pumpkin Loaf” on Thanksgiving Day and shared photos with a link to the recipe. Oh my, it looked so good! It’s a great recipe that leaves some room to play, to make it your own.

My "Loaded Loaves"

I made 2 loaves that will be gifts and two mini loaves to try them out. I added raisins to the recipe and after David and I tried it, I’ll probably use a little less ginger than the recipe calls for next time. I think it tastes wonderful, but David doesn’t care for the ginger flavor. I doubled the recipe and it made 2 loaves and 2 minis. Maybe next time, I’ll add the ginger last and divide the batter to make half with and half without

Flora's coasters

If you’re still thinking of some non-edible gift ideas with a personal touch that you still have time to make, there is a great idea for coaster sets on Flora’s blog, This and That. They are so sweet! The coaster sets are so cute and I do still need a couple small gifts. There’s just not enough time to cross stitch a set of ornaments anymore! If you give a look before Saturday (12/10) when she’s going to draw a name from the comments, you can have a chance to win a hand-made set of coasters from her! I entered for the drawing, but should I win, I don’t know if I would give them as a gift. Maybe I’d give them to David so I’d have them too!

Okay, off to fix lunch and get back to work!

Links

Lynne’s blog: Cottage and Creek, Holiday Pumpkin Loaf

Christmas Gift Loaf Recipe at allrecipes.com

Flora’s blog: This and That, Christmas Gifts to Make

Photoblog Wednesday

2011-12-07T07:35:00.003-05:00

Shadow Dancing In The Evening Light
Hannibal, MO
5/31/11

This was the last train we photographed for the day and I loved how the setting sun cast the shadow of the crossing gate on the train, I also TRULY loved getting it on an old weathered car with NO GRAFFITI!

(I especially love this photo right now because it was taken on a lazy, warm evening this year!)

Ohio - Barn Capital?

2011-12-06T17:06:00.005-05:00

Ohio is great barn country! Yesterday when we did our errands, I decided to count the barns I could see off the I-75 between Bowling Green Ohio and the interchange with I-475, roughly 13 miles. I counted 52 barns and a mosque in the interesting buildings off of I-75! I mentioned the mosque because, like so many holy buildings, it’s a gorgeous piece of architecture! But FIFTY-TWO barns! Anyone who wondered why they chose to paint barns in each county for the Ohio Bicentennial in 2003, well, 52 in 13 miles just outside of the metro area here might give an idea why!

As for today’s barn…

Last week, on November 30, David had a flexible day off and he took it then because there had been some nice snow cover west of us in Ohio and in Northeastern Indiana. We woke up before dawn to get to where the snow was to photograph trains, barns and anything else scenic. We got some great train shots and I took some beautiful shots of flocked snow on the trees through the passenger’s side window, but this was the first barn of the day, breathtaking with the fresh snow and light from the rising sun!

This was in Montpelier, Ohio, taken off an overpass that David drove back over a couple of times to get the right angle. The white barn and white snow and golden morning light just begged to be photographed!

Free Is Good

2011-12-06T00:06:00.006-05:00

I’m in grumbly money mood. Okay, not that grumbly, but David and I went out and did grocery shopping before he went to work Monday. It was the big shopping trip where I bought all of the ingredients for my Davinities as well as groceries and some of the non-perishables for UNO and the Fabulous Dessert Bar, less than 2 weeks away! When you put all those items together, well, my pocketbook is still warm. At least a few hours later it stopped smoking!

I love to give, but not to the stores! So to get the nasty money out of my head I thought about some of the things I’d been given for free!

I got this ornament from Bronners, my favorite Christmas store, in Frankenmuth, Michigan. Yes, it’s true, I got the free ornament because they had the right way to say “Merry Christmas” to enough special people on my list, but it was still a nice freebie!

This is a freebie I didn't have to buy anything for! Café Escapes had joined my followers on Twitter! So, I checked them out and saw that they’d offered a sample of their 4 K-Cups to someone and asked them what I needed to do to get a sample. They told me to send a private tweet with my address!

I’ve tried the chai latte and the mocha. I wasn’t crazy about the Chai, but the Mocha is awesome! I have a dark and a milk hot cocoa left!

So the internal tremor of my grocery bill has calmed and I am ready to put hands and heart to the first Dainties of 2011 tomorrow! And while I’m appreciating the freebies that brought me the inner peace I craved, I want to share a freebie too!

It’s Christmas All Over The World was the first professional scrapbook kit I did when I had my store at Scrap Bird. The shining jewel of that kit was the ornaments that say Merry Christmas in English, Italian, French, Spanish, Polish, German, Swedish and Portuguese. I still like how those and the world map ornament turned out and I’ve repackaged the ornaments to share! Just click the preview to go to the download.

And ya know what? Now I feel even better!

Merry Christmas!

Get Rid of the Stains, Not Your Pet

2011-12-05T22:43:00.003-05:00

It’s been a productive night for me. I got the kitchen tile scrubbed and ready for baking. Next pre-holiday room is the living room. There are 2 problems with the living room cleanup; Kaline and Carla!

I have to find something comparable to The Steam Team in Austin, Texas. They will clean almost anything in your home! While the girls are girls, so they don’t spray, they seem to have delicate stomachs! We have problems with kitty vomit! We clean it as best we can, but after a while, our beige carpet gets a little polka dotted! One of the many areas The Steam Team in Austin specializes in is stain odor removal. If you have a cat or dog that’s had an accident on the rug, you know how valuable it is to unstain and unsmell things!

The Steam Team in Austin does upholstery too! Check out this page: http://www.thesteamteam.com/austin-cleaning-services/upholstery.shtml If you love your pet as much as we love our kitty-girls, they’re a part of your family. They curl up with you to watch TV and well, I know a cat’s been responsible for spilled hot cocoa once, or twice! A company that can restore the room you love to be in can put you and the pet you love back in harmony.

If you’re in Austin, you owe it to yourself to check out The Steam Team!

Meet Me On Monday

2011-12-05T09:16:00.002-05:00

Welcome to Monday! David is working later today, so there is so much to do! But I still have a few moments to be social. I’ll finish MMOM blog crawling this evening!

1. Monday's are _________?
2. What is your favorite kind of milkshake?
3. What monthly bill do you most dislike paying?
4. How many email addresses do you use on a regular basis?
5. What color lights are on your Christmas Tree?

Monday's are _________?
Monday is the beginning of a new week. I’m refreshed from the weekend and ready to go. And no, that’s not just because I’m not 9-5 working right now. I’ve felt this way about Mondays my whole adult life!

What is your favorite kind of milkshake?
This time of year EGGNOG! I’ve had one small eggnog shake at McDonald’s and I try really hard to control it, but I’ll have another one, I’m sure. I try to keep it limited to one a week, but when it’s gone, I’ll go back to Jamoca at Arby’s once in a while.

What monthly bill do you most dislike paying?
David says whatever one is the biggest. I kinda agree!

How many email addresses do you use on a regular basis?
3 – my main personal address, The Chronicles of Nani and my school address.

What color lights are on your Christmas Tree?
We use multi-colored lights. I used to use gold lights on my formal tree when I was in Michigan.

Monday Mug Shot

2011-12-05T08:40:00.004-05:00

Eat-N-Park

This is a nice, big hot cocoa, turmeric tea or hot cider mug! Just last night I had Ron and Franks Hot Apple Cider from it. Mmmm… No sugar, no caffeine, no chilly!

This is not an advertisement for Eat-N-Park. It is an unsolicited testimonial! Hehehe.

The coolest thing about this much is the colors. It’s a Pittsburgh company and it’s in Pittsburgh Steelers colors! I bought it on a Sunday when there were lots of Steelers jerseys on patrons and staff! We’re talking great corporate citizenship. At other times of the year it could be a Penguins or Pirates mug as well! For today’s memory, it would be Pirates colors.

In the summer of 2008, I got to introduce Tori to my favorite Pennsylvania restaurant. We’d taken the girls on trips separately. This had a lot to do with that the train festival Rina wanted to with us to was absolutely not Tori’s cup of tea! She’s okay with sitting around while we chase a couple trains, but for the whole weekend? No way! So, we did a little investigating and she chose to go to Hershey.

Now, the greatest challenge with Hershey in the summer is NOT the amusement park, which we didn’t go to. That’s a trip we really should make with both of the girls. We did go to the Hershey museum and Hershey’s Chocolate World. We made a day of it there, going on the chocolate ride that tells you how kisses are made, with free chocolate at the end, and seeing some of the exhibits. David ducked out for a couple of trains while Tori and I were at the 3-D chocolate theater and went to a chocolate tasting. The freebie after the tasting was one of the big 4-ounce bars of Hershey’s Milk Chocolate. I was glad it was that because Tori didn’t care for any of the darks we tasted.

While in Hershey we ate a dinner and a breakfast at Eat-N-Park. Breakfast was where Tori really appreciated it! She and I both had the Smiley pancakes. Pancakes with a smile and bacon is a breakfast just made for her, me too!

They are a family restaurant, but so much more. There is the standard fare that attracts the kids, not just Smiley cookies, but Smiley fries and Smiley pancakes. But there are also fantastic dishes for the adults too, great NOT fired fish dishes, lean and flavorful chicken dishes, out of this world soups and a great salad bar. They also have espresso-based drinks that rival Starbucks. In fact, I think Eat-N-Park has the edge on Starbucks Pumpkin Spice lattes! We’ve never had bad food or bad service and we’ve eaten at enough of them that you’d think by now…knock on wood.

Yummy food, yummy memories and I’m waiting for the Toledo location to open! Please??

The Morning After

2011-12-04T14:33:00.005-05:00

It was raining this morning, so maybe that had something to do with it, but, oh was I sore! I was wondering if maybe I’d overdone it a bit yesterday, but right now I’m feeling pretty good. So maybe it was more the rain than anything this morning. My hands are still a little clumbsy though. You should see what this looked like before I typo and spell checked it! In looking ahead to a straight week of baking coming up before Christmas, I think I’ll slow down a little and stretch it out. I can do the Krisp Kringles and frosted cookies a little earlier because they keep well.

This is from the Davinities Test Kitchen. I am SO pleased! They are almond sugar cookies with sprinkled almond buttercream. The distinction here is that it’s not cream made with almond butter, but butter cream splashed with almond milk. That’s a note to me because I didn’t write it down yet. The almond sugar cookies are a new Davinities recipe and I might add them to this year’s lineup; that’s how pleased I am with my new recipe!

Every now and then, a recipe just sounds so good that you have to buy that one ingredient you’ve never used, even though it comes in a larger bag and the recipe only calls for a cup. That was me with Marie’s recipe for the French Macarons. Also, just the cookie part without the French cream filling is very low in Weight Watchers points! But that left me with a large bag of almond flour left, so almonds have been on my cooking creative brain lately. The macarons were very good, but I’ll probably make them again after I can afford a standing mixer! In this recipe, the almond sugar cookie dough is made into small balls, rolled in almond flour and placed on parchment to be flattened lightly with the bottom of a glass. Now I just need to let the frosting set and I can package a sample up this evening to add to the boxes.

That’s the formal tree in my contemporary living room that I mentioned yesterday. The little coffee bar was to the left, next to the desk. Oh, I was wrong about the burgundy dress on the angel. I have a gold-haired light-up angel ornament with a burgundy dress. The gold angel on top is the one on top of our tree at home now. This was in 2001 or 02. There wasn’t a date on the photo and I don’t really have time to do an album search to get the year, but it was after I fell in love with a lace ornament with pink and light blue ribbon, so I got 6 light blue glass balls to make it work!

While I’m showing off that tree, let’s visit the other extreme.

This photo is Dave and me in the finished basement of our home in Southgate Michigan, in 1973. We’re making Christmas ornaments! Mom did a craft with us at Christmastime every year. In 1973, when Dave was six and I was seven, Mom made homemade uncolored play dough, rolled it out and used Christmas cookie cutters on it. Then she baked them with ornament hooks in them. They came out hard and once they cooled, we went to town with the paint! Mom painted with us and did a camel with a fringed blanket on it and eyes and everything. It was gorgeous and it frustrated me almost beyond what my 7-year-old ego could stand! I tried, I really tried, to paint my ornaments in beautiful detail like Mom’s camel. She’d done a pretty angel and some balls, but the camel is what will always stick out in my mind as a skill I couldn’t quite accomplish. Never mind that Mom painted ceramics as a hobby and I was 7 years old at the time. I just wanted my ornaments to look as nice as that darned camel.

It is a great memory. I know now that my Mom was just very talented with paint! I can’t paint that well now, either. A generation later, I did a Christmas craft every year with Tori and Rina when they were little. We made felt and sequin ornaments, glitter drawing on satin balls and we even did play dough ornaments one year. There were stars and bells and circles, but, there were NO CAMELS! We used to put the name and date of the artist on the back, so if the ornaments survived, we’d know when each craft was done. I was almost in tears in 2008. The girls got me an ornament for Christmas, a glass baseball with my name on the front. They made sure I looked on the back. They had the year put on the back, “because we always dated the special ones.”

And now it’s time to clean up the kitchen, put together my grocery list and wrap up the last of the packages for the mail tomorrow.

Gimme a Break

2011-12-03T18:55:00.001-05:00

No, seriously, it’s break time. I’m so pleased that I’ve had energy today and I have, for me, gotten so much done! Of course, that energy is gone now and I could SO take a nap! This too shall pass with some rest and a blog post!

All of the gifts for the Secret Santa Soiree are wrapped, plus another gift that I’m sending out Monday. I’ve got them boxed with a little space, so if tomorrow goes as planned, as it often does, I’ll include a treat from the Davinities Test Kitchen. The official Production Kitchen opens on Tuesday and I usually do a “warm-up,” try out a new recipe or two. I’m looking at a loaf recipe or a sugar drop cookie, probably with cinnamon, that I want to try a new technique with. We’ll see what I feel like playing with tomorrow.

David has been on a “play date” today in Michigan at an ops session. Ops session – model railroad operation. I’ve been to an operating session with him before. It’s awesome! I kinda can’t wait until we have David’s layout built. I’d go more often but it’s a lot of standing, which I can’t do, usually in someone’s basement, and I don’t do stairs much, and there needs to be a “boys day” every now and then! I could say I don’t mind if they “belch and scratch,” but most guys will still not allow themselves the freedom to”just be guys” when someone’s wife or girlfriend is there.

So, aside from wrapping, I got my shopping almost done this morning before David was even awake. That is to say I filled three cyber shopping carts, but I had to close them when he came in, so I actually hit the “finish purchase” buttons after he left. After that, I turned on the Christmas station.

I got one counter section of the kitchen cleared and scrubbed, ready for baking. Then I went to the basement and got a load of laundry started. Then it was wrapping time, still with the Christmas station on, it’s been on all day, and a few of the Holiday Spice Lindor Truffles David got me. I was happy and feeling nostalgic.

I am not, nor have I ever been, very good at wrapping. It starts with the one place I consistently got bad marks in kindergarten. I failed scissors! They let me graduate to scissors with points on the end and now that I’m an adult, they’ll even let me buy the curvy and zigzag scissors! I actually have a few different shapes of craft scissors, but really, I use the digital tools SO much better! Part of my wrapping trouble is that I use regular scissors and it looks like I used zigzags that need sharpening! I learned the art of the fold-over for the seams!

One of my favorite papers!
See the Nani-jags??

When I was 21, I completely redid my room at home. I painted all my wood trim black, got a gray fold out couch, a black lacquer entertainment center and coffee table and I painted a homemade shelving unit black. I had the carpet redone in mauve with two walls in grey and white panel and two painted burgundy.

For Christmas, I had a green tree decorated in pink, burgundy and mauve with lots of bead and lace ornaments. There were jesters and carousel horses and a bund Gundy-gowned angel on top. It was a very formal tree in a very urban-looking room. It suited me at the time. That shelving unit had a coffee pot AND espresso maker with all the frou-frou coffee trimmings. There was a shelf behind the coffee bar with tins of coffee beans for my grind it into the filter pot. My black octagon glass dishes served festive holiday treats and on the door hung a sign that read “Elfin Sweat Shop.”

I’d set up my card table and the room was filled with paper, bows, ribbons and tape. Mom and I would wrap together, Grandma and I wrapped together and one night every year they kicked me out of my own room and they wrapped! I was like a little kid. They gave me cookies and put Rudolph on downstairs. I had Santa Claus Is Coming To Town too, in case I'd been REAL good!!

Mom was a Christmas nut! She always gave a bunch of little things as well as big gift and a few nice medium gifts. She loved to wrap everything because the more she could put under the tree, the more it looked like the sleigh crashed in our living room, the happier she was. She was the only child of an only child. Her parents had one child and her maternal grandparents had just one grandchild. She grew up in post World War 2 America. As a kid she had everything “we didn’t have,” “that we fought for,” “that I owe you for not meeting you until after your first birthday.” It wasn’t guilt; it was what they all felt she was entitled to. She was showered with what her parents and grandparents didn’t have. She grew up only knowing giving at Christmas in abundance. As an adult that’s how she gave. It’s what I was taught!

Wrapping nights were usually Mom, Grandma and me drinking flavored coffee and nibbling on Davinities or a nut loaf and talking, reminiscing about Christmases in the past, anticipating the cooking for the Holiday and when my Dad used to dress up as Santa and came to Noni’s house on Christmas Eve. Pop was Santa at the Kresge store Grandma managed before she retired too. He talked to all the kids and gave candy canes and one time, a friend of Noni’s was looking at him like “I know you, but can’t place you.” He called her by name and said he was Santa in the San Marinese dialect. He always laughs when he tells that story because her eyes got incredulously wide, like she was on Candid Camera!

Okay, I’m rested up enough to do a little more now. If you’re home from shopping, say “hi!” If you have some wrapping traditions, what are they? Do you wrap with someone else as an event, or do you wrap privately surprising everyone on Christmas Day?

School’s Out!

2011-12-02T23:37:00.007-05:00

Aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! My final paper was turned in just before I went to bed Thursday night. Now it’s HOLIDAY TIME!

I always love and have always loved the day after school finishes, be it graduation, the summer or just Christmas break. Yes, for the first four grades there was never talk of it being anything but Christmas break. No winter break, no holiday break, it was CHRISTMAS break. Of course for the first four grades I went to a Catholic school! Hehehe

Last night David and I went to Milan Michigan to wait for the Canadian Pacific Holiday Train. Every year CP runs the holiday train. The Holiday Train stops at different places on its route, live music plays and collections for local food banks are done. It’s very cool. Since CP doesn’t own any track through Michigan and Ohio on the way to Chicago, they run on Norfolk Southern track, so they don’t make stops. But, the train is just incredible to see, especially at night! Picture several neighbors in a row, all with huge and bright Christmas displays on their lawns. Now, put those laws on cars and put them on the rails without pulling the plug on the lights. That’s what we saw!

Canadian Pacific Holiday Train
My first attempt at night time photography

That’s the best one I got. Doesn’t do the train justice, but I took the opportunity to play with the manual settings on my camera. For no tripod night shots of moving light with a camera that’s only semi manual, I think I did pretty well! Still, PLEASE check out the link below to see an outstanding shot of this remarkable holiday train!! For scrapping, I’m going to get the okay to use a better shot and put my first try with it. I can still make it an awesome scrapbook page!

I want to bring back an old regular Chronicles of Nani favorite; well it was a favorite of mine. Friday By Request was something I started back in the Yahoo 360 days. You tell me what to blog! I’ll write about any subject, show a photo, make a scrapbook page, write poetry, anything you ask. The only requirement is that it has to be in the moral spirit of The Chronicles of Nani. This is a family coffee shop on the Information Superhighway.

Click the Friday By Request tag and see some of the ones I’ve done here. If you have a challenge for me, drop me an email at chronicleofnani@gmail.com. I’ll do the first request I receive each week by Monday at 6PM Eastern Time zone. If I don’t have a request, there is no FBR. If I have more than one request in a given week, I’ll do the first one I receive. I always do the first request I receive after the Friday By Request is posted. If I don’t have a request, I’ll do a “leftover" request, but I’ll encourage you to resend your request the next week. I’ve only had more than one request a couple times since I started doing it in 2007, so if you have an idea, there’s a pretty good chance I’ll do it! When you send your email, be sure to let me know what name you’d like used when I post your request and if you have a blog URL, I’ll add that to the post.

I hope you’ll consider giving me a challenge!

Links
Canadian Pacific Holiday Train

Friday By Request Tag
Send me a Request!

Photoblog Wednesday

2011-11-30T06:13:00.004-05:00

Lycoming Valley Railroad
December 11, 2009

A Cup of Coffee and a City-Barn

2011-11-28T23:51:00.006-05:00

Cyber Monday came and went and I bought nothing! But one gift I bought on Saturday came today! I hope to have my paper done for school by the end of the day today, Wednesday at the latest. I will do some more cyber-shopping tomorrow, then next week some time I’m going to do to Michigan and do a little shopping with Aunt Judy. She says she’ll push if they don’t have scooters at Target! We’re going to time it so that we’d be getting back when Pop gets home so we can have lunch together before I go home.

So how is everybody’s shopping going so far? Did you get good deals Friday? Or did you stay home with those of us that aren’t brave enough to battle the crowds? As I’m getting ready to finish my list, I’m going back to ROASTe for a couple things. No, this is not just an ad. I’m picky about the sponsors I choose to support and ROASTe is also a vendor I’ve used and plan to again. Not only have I become hopelessly addicted to Caramel Crunch decaf in the evening, so I’ll need a new bag of that, but I’m impressed with some of the gift sets too.

The Stovetop Espresso Pot gift set includes an Italian-style coffee tin and espresso roast Italian coffee to put in it! I have an espresso machine, but I remember that type of pot as the way espresso has always been made! That type of pot was where Noni made the teaspoon of coffee that made a scoop of vanilla ice cream "cappuccino" for her grandkids. So trust me on this one - it really is how they do it in Italy! This set won’t get you the free shipping for orders over $35, especially with the 10% off you get with the code at The Chronicles of Nani, but if you add this, you’ll make it:

I think I want to try some of the holiday flavors! The 2-pack of Peppermint Mocha and Sugar Plum is under $10 before the discount! If you have a coffee, lover or a gourmet aficionado on your list, you really owe it to your Santa-self to check out ROASTe. They have a great selection and if you can’t decide email a gift card!

For me, this would be my choice:

Mahogany Roster’s Holiday Joy Gift Pack comes with Holiday Blend coffee and a decorated mug! How Nani, huh?

Now for everyone who came here to see a barn and I don’t blame you. I love barns as much as I love coffee, here it is:

Barn Charm

We passed this barn on Thanksgiving Day on the way out of town to go to my Dad’s for football and dinner. David is kinda starting to get into my barn chasing, making a point of passing this one and stopping without me asking. He says he thinks this one is the only working barn in the city of Toledo. Pretty cool, huh? Yes, Toledo really is a little bit city and a little bit country. We have tall buildings, sports teams, big acts in our downtown arena and all the chains, but we also get the occasional deer that walks through our front yard and a real working barn in our city limits.

I liked the look of the barn with the dark green roof and the red tractor on the left. Even without the sun, I was thinking of asking David to pullover, but he beat me to that!

For more great barns, check out Bluff Area Daily’s Barn Charm