Happy Leftovers Day!

Fall Cornucopia by Jeanette ONeil

Isn’t that a great image? It’s a public domain photo by Jeanette ONeil. She has some nice stuff. There is a link to donate if you choose. I sent her a cup of coffee, maybe a tall Starbucks if she wants to!

I love cornucopias. The symbolism jet gets me, it feels like an accurate symbol for me. It seems like no matter how big the cornucopia for any given part of my life is, it’s spilling over in abundance. No matter what is bad in my world, I can stuff it in the bottom of my personal cornucopia and smother it with the joy that scatters out onto my table of life.

I hope you don’t think I‘m being too corny! ;)


We had a small, but very nice feast yesterday. Aunt Judy made a pumpkin pie that was TO DIE FOR! I like the boxed pies just fine, but made from scratch has always got that “something.”

It wasn’t such a great football day. Green Bay is still quite undefeated and the Lions still haven’t figured out how to win on Thanksgiving Day, at home, with any real success, but it was still tradition to watch. I wonder if the Lions losing has become part of that tradition too?

Today is Green and Red Friday. I don’t and have never done Black Friday. I think competitive shopping is about as opposite of Holiday Spirit as you can get. BUT, I know there are a lot of people who enjoy it and consider it a kick-off to holiday giving. I hope they all had fun and got great deals. But to the ones who threw punches in Toledo or the woman who pepper sprayed Wal-Mart customers to get the deal first in California; SHAME ON YOU! You’re not celebrating anything but selfishness and ill will. Personally, I don’t ever want to receive a gift from that kind of behavior. Bring me a card and have coffee with me and if you can’t pick out a card without violence, just have coffee. Gifts that come from violence lose their worth before they even leave the store. It’s a cruel message to call a gift.

Holiday and soap box in one paragraph, wow! LOL

So far, Green and Red Friday has been putting my Christmas music on my blog, and listening to Christmas music. I still have essays and a final paper to finish for school, which should all be done by Wednesday morning at the latest. By the way, there are a few different styles of Christmas music and none of the songs are really long, but if you do want to, you can scroll to the bottom of the page and choose another song.



Okay, now for Five Minute Friday!

The Gypsy Mama has supplied an appropriately seasonal prompt word this day after Thanksgiving, “GRATEFUL.”

Here’s my five minutes:


GO!I’m grateful that I’m an optimist, thankful that I choose to be happy and make the most of everything I’m given.

I was diagnosed with Primary Progressive Multiple Sclerosis this year. I’ve joined some online sites with other MS patients and I’ve realized that I am truly thankful that I have the foundation of my own optimism to face this with. SO many are lost in a dark gloom in dealing with what they cannot do rather than appreciating what they still CAN do. Not surprisingly to me, the ones with the more common Recurring Relapsing MS, who only have symptoms with a flare up and can be almost normal in between flare-ups, are worse in their gloom than others with the progressive forms of the disease. I thought I’d prefer the control, of always having symptoms better than the uncertainty of symptoms coming and going at will that wasn’t mine. But too many with RRMS are gloomy when they are not feeling much or any of the symptoms. It’s a feeling of impending doom.

I wish there was more I could do to share my positive feelings with them, with anyone who feels the oppression of bad feelings. I wish I could do more to help others facing pain or limitations they didn’t sign up for. But I selfishly fear being drug into the negativity too.

I am so grateful for medication that I can feel working, the support of my husband and my wonderful family of friends and relatives. I'm grateful because of how my affliction allows me to see the very best in total strangers as they openly offer to help me in so many ways. I’m grateful for this wonderful world we’ve been given and for the wonderful majority of the community on earth who doesn’t make the news; the kind, giving and compassionate people we share the roads, streets and halls with every day.

I love people!


STOP!

Links:

More Images by Jeanette ONeil

Carla's Five Minutes

Me and Mommy

Hi everyone! It’s me, Carla Yastrzemski! Mommy usually does the 5 minute Friday but I wanted to do this one. Mommy has school, stuff to do and I don’t start school, until next year, so I can do it. I’m gonna do it on her blog because 5-Minute Friday is a Mommy’s blog thing, not ours.

So, I get 5 minutes to talk about the word grow. Kaline is gonna time me so I don’t write too much.


Okay, GO!

Well, growing started when I was a kitten. I don’t remember being a kitten so much. I think I had a home for a while. Mommy and Daddy say that’s why I am so cuddly.

For some time I was a kitten on the streets, so I didn’t really grow up in a home. I grew up the hard way. There was a tomcat I thought was nice, but he hurt me and then I had kittens on the way, growing inside me. Tom left and I was alone.

A nice lady found me and helped me have my kittens. But, I wasn’t in real good shape and my kittens never got a chance to grow. Then the lady took me to the shelter where I could be cared for and they’d help me find a home.

In October 2009, after a rough life in the streets and then living in a cage, I met nice people who came to see cats at the shelter. Those people ended up being Mommy and Daddy who took me home.

I didn’t get along with my new brother and sister at all at first, but we grew on each other.

I grew sad when Baggle died. I missed him, but Kaline and I grew better together as sisters. Now I see that I grow happier every day. Now I AM growing up in a home!

Stop


What do you think? How’d I do?

Keep Reading Mommy’s blog and stop by Behind Orange Eyes and read our blog too!

Carla


Kaline and I are going to The Gypsy Mama's blog to read some more 5 Minute Fridays! You should too!

A Freebie and 5-Minute Friday

I’ve been juggling the last chapters for school and the outline and research for my final paper with cooking, cleaning, holiday preparation and trying to keep my current scrapbooks within 6 months of up-to-date. Oh yeah, I also have a project that I‘ve been working on for the last four years that I’ll be wrapping up soon. It keeps me out of trouble.

I’ve decided that I’ll be taking next semester off school and I’m going to slowly but surely get the house up to workable accessibility. I’m thinking that I can get everything but the stairs walker and reach friendly. If I can manage that on our 1950’s house, creating some simple tools to help, there may be a consulting future. Hmmm… Well, at the very least a few contracts? I’ll DO the job first. Advertise later if it works!


We have great ADA guidelines for people with disabilities to enjoy productive lives in the comfort of their “normal” wherever we go. Unfortunately the ADA guidelines are a good start but that half sentence is documented with a period. There is a lot open to interpretation. Businesses often do the bare minimum to be legal and don't bother with keeping those standards current

For Instance:


That ledge is on the wheelchair ramp at our local Tim Horton's. The smaller front wheels of most wheelchairs might be destroyed hitting that ledge, or it could just stop the chair short and throw the person sitting in the chair to the ground. Neither result is acceptable! Not to mention the dropped ramp there is a lawsuit begging to happen. When Rina and I went into the shop when these photos were taken, she backed me up over the side of the ramp, which was actually a lower lip than the top.

I’m sending an email with the photos to Tim Horton’s corporate office. I’m not looking for anything but to have it fixed. I like Tim Horton’s, but I can’t go to the store closest to me on my own because it just wouldn’t be safe. That ledge is obvious enough that an able-bodied 17-year-old saw it immediately. It's not an easily missed little thing.


Back to keeping the scrapbook caught up, I did this page this week:

Credits: Siren by Viva Artistry, Panel Template by Digitalegacies Designs

I did this page, as I often do, by creating the layout and adding the pictures and papers later. That means I have a digital template to share!

Download link in five minutes! (At the end of the post)



Five Minute Friday

5 Minute Friday was fun last week and since I was up earkly today, I definitely have some time to devote 5 minutes.

Today’ word is unexpected.


GO

The best things are the unexpected things. Flowers on Valentine’s Day are wonderful, but flowers for no reason at all are even better.

When I try something new and expect there to be a learning curve and I do well, that’s an unexpected ego boost. When things DON”T go as planned, that’s an unexpected opportunity to learn. Okay, Nani looks at the lemonade stand when she has lemons is NOT unexpected, but what fun would life be without SOME stability? As much fun as it would be with no surprises. The unexpected is what keeps life exciting.

I always say I don’t like people to just drop by to visit. Truth is, I always enjoy it more than I feel inconvenienced when someone doesn’t call first.

STOP


Definitely click that icon and check out Lisa-Jo’s blog. Lots of interesting and fun stuff there!

Download the Digitalegacies Designs Panel Template

I Remember…

Oh the blog world is so much fun! Last Thursday I joined Vintage Thingie Thursday at Suzanne’s blog, Coloradolady, for the first time. I’d been wanting to do that. I love antiques and heirlooms and well, I have quite a few of them as now I am the family matriarch. Grandma was an only child, so was Mom. That pretty much leaves me as the oldest on Mom's side of the family. The next statement will send chills down David’s spine. I’m planning on hanging around a good while and I’m keeping the stuff!

Truth be told, I was very self- restrained in selecting the treasures I kept from Grandma’s place when we cleaned it up, but I still brought home a few, several few, boxes of things. Since things didn’t quite go as planned this year, I’m going to make next year the reclaiming our living space year. We’ll see how things are going once I start my MS meds and physical therapy. I’m seriously thinking of taking the next semester off so I can really put some time in on the millennium cleaning project. Then do an on-campus summer class and really work on practical use of the wheelchair, or walker if things really go well. Not setting a goal there until I am doing it with my therapist! Then I want to get on the job seeking again.

Well, it’s Friday night and David is at a train slide gathering with a few friends. I wanted to get my school work for the week done today because we’re all converging in Toledo tomorrow to take my Dad out for his birthday! We were in Michigan last year and we’ll go to Indianapolis next year, but this year I get to show off for Pop. If you followed the link to La Scola from last night’s blog, is your mouth just watering from the photos? They open at four in the afternoon and you could be on a full stomach from a late lunch when you drive by and the smell will make you want to stop!

So, school stuff done, I did a little reading, and a little writing. I read Suzanne’s post for Five Minute Friday and went back to the source of the prompt, The Gypsy Mama, and read hers. It’s a cool concept. You get a prompt and you just write for 5 minutes, then stop. For me that’s, then stop and fix all the typos, but when I only get 5 minutes, I’m not careful about typing accuracy! But this week the prompt is “Remember.” I do timed exercises like that and I’m always amazed where it takes me when I “just write.” This was no exception. I had a thought in mind that went completely a different direction when I set fingers to keyboard.



I Remember

GO

I remember so many things. One of the gifts I’m most grateful for is my long memory. I remember sights, the lights on the juke box and the look up at the counter. That memory, those pictures in my mind are of the bar my paternal grandfather took me to, to show off his grandbaby to his friends. Mom told him not to take me to the bar, but Nono didn’t listen. He wasn’t doing any harm. Mom said she could always easily tell he’d taken me because I had a handful of chocolate covered quarters, gifts from Nono’s friends.

In this day and age a man could never walk into the corner bar with a child under two, but although they're just little snippets of video in my mind, and stories I was told later, I treasure those moments that have always been with me. I only had 6 years with Nono when cancer took him away from all of us, from me. But I’ll always remember the cherished feeling of being his first grandchild.

STOP