Last Tuesday, my bobbin tension screws
arrived from Handi Quilter in North Salt Lake, Utah. I happily ripped open the padded envelope,
took a look, and thought, Aarrgghh, they’re way too small; they sent the
wrong ones. Nevertheless, I decided
to try one – and whataya know, I was wrong.
They are the right size.
Wow, no wonder I couldn’t find that thing when it fell out. The heads of those screws are barely an
eighth of an inch across.
Screw in place and adjusted, I proceeded
to load the pillow sham top that matched the Fairy Forest quilt I’d quilted the
previous week. And then it was time to
call Loren and make him a meal.
By 7:00 p.m., the pillow sham was quilted, and everything was packed in a box ready for shipping.
I gathered up laptop, cellphone, and coffee mug and
migrated across the landing to my little office to scan old photos. How many could I get scanned before a quilt
arrived from Washington State?
181
photos, it turned out, as the quilt arrived two days later.
We had just finished eating when
Hannah, Joanna, Nathanael, and Levi arrived bearing birthday gifts. Hannah gave me this picture she found
somewhere; it’s hand-embroidered. Note
the ‘Purrnina’ logo on the machine. You
know I love Bernina sewing machines, right?
😊 And cats.
Bobby came shortly thereafter to help
Larry cut up the deer he’d gotten the night before. Fortunately, I’d fixed the whole bag of
Schwan’s Sweet & Sour Chicken with Rice & Vegetables, as he hadn’t had
supper yet. It’s described on Schwan’s
website as “white-meat chicken with pineapple, green and red peppers, carrots,
and water chestnuts in a tangy sweet-and-sour sauce over a bed of long-grain
white rice”. Yummy stuff.
While Hannah and the children and I chatted (and ate banana nut muffins and drank Alo® Aloe Vera
Fuji Apple & Pear juice), I got all of Norma’s old family photos that I
recently scanned – 1,262 pictures – loaded onto 18 new flash drives. I’ll give
them to our children, Larry’s brother and his children, and Larry’s sister for
Christmas.
Joanna gave me a pair of soft, fuzzy,
white and lavender slipper socks and a big piece of vanilla fudge with caramel. That fudge lasted Larry and me four days.
Late that night, it began thundering
and lightninginginging (I never know when to stop, with that word), and soon rain
started coming down.
My father used to open
our garage door and stand there under the overhanging eave to watch storms. I loved standing there beside him, holding his
hand, watching the lightning, listening to the thunder, and collecting little
pieces of hail if they came bouncing into the garage.
Wednesday, I went on scanning
photos. The album I’m now scanning is
full of pictures of Victoria as a new baby – and here’s a shot of Keith with
his first pickup, a ’93 F150 Ford. It was April 24, 1997. Keith did a good deal of the rebuilding himself,
with Larry’s help. Larry painted it.
I sent a copy to Keith,
and he soon replied, “That was my pride and joy of a truck.”
“It was a pretty one!” I said.
“Absolutely loved it,” Keith
agreed. “Made a good $10k profit on that,
too,” he added.
He then sent pictures of the Utah mountains
covered with snow.
“Beautiful,” I said. “I’ve been looking at the snow reports... and
I wanna be in the middle of it!”
“Ha, 😬” wrote Keith,
somewhat disbelieving, I thought.
I added a disclaimer: “Well, with a warm brick at my feet, of course.”
“This is Trappers’ Loop Road between
Green Mountain and Huntsville, Utah,” Keith told me. “It’s a steep mountain pass between towns
that we haul a lot of concrete to.” (He
drives a cement truck.)
That afternoon after taking Loren some
food, I took my customer’s quilts to the post office and shipped them off to
Virginia.
Soon it was time for church, always a
welcome break in the middle of our busy week.
I tucked several large, shiny postcards into my church purse for some of
the grandsons, and also a cute little felt snowman. It can be used as a Christmas tree
decoration, and it has a pocket in front, too.
The snowman was for Keira, as I only
had one (found amongst Norma’s things a while back). I tucked a little picture cut from the back
of a calendar into the pocket.
After church, I doled out the postcards
to Jacob (he got this one with a picture of a bright red 1955 Chevy pickup),
Jonathan, and Ian; handed out small picture cards to Carolyn, Violet, and Eva
(who generally has hers folded in half within five minutes – but she likes it,
and that’s what’s important); and, as soon as there were no onlookers who might
feel slighted, I gave Keira the snowman.
She was delighted. Hester told me that Keira has recently taken
a big shine to pockets, so this was just the ticket.
The next morning, Hester sent a picture
of Keira in her car seat, still playing with the little felt snowman. Yep, I think I chose the right child to give
it to. 😊
Victoria, Carolyn, and Violet came visiting that afternoon, bringing me a Strawberry & Rhubarb Pie scented candle, and two bars of handmade soap, one with Lily-of-the-Valley fragrance, and one with Wild Honeysuckle. Those are three of my favorite scents (and flavors!) right there. Mmmmm...
Like Bobby and Hannah’s children, these
two love to read, and head straight for the bookcases after they come in and
greet me. Carolyn just turned four;
Violet just turned three.
By the time I stopped scanning old
pictures that night, I had reached a total of 21,251.
A quilt from a customer in Washington State
came shortly before noon on Friday, bringing a halt to the photo-scanning.
The
UPS man came to the door... started to hand me the box... and then suddenly
jerked it back and stared toward the floor.
Reckon he’d caught a glimpse of what he thought was one o’ them thar
nasty li’l ankle-biters? 😂
I read the funnies while I ate a late
breakfast.
In the comment section under Calvin &
Hobbes, wherein Calvin was scheming ways to take over the world, someone commented,
“I’ve never understood why anyone would even want to ‘rule the world’. We are such an unruly bunch.”
The comments are often funnier than the
comics themselves.
I went upstairs to my quilting studio to see how much I could get done before it was time to call Loren.
When I called at 3:00 p.m. as usual, he said
I didn’t need to bring anything, as he had plenty of food. After asking what all was in his
refrigerator, and knowing that I’d taken him a little more food than usual the
previous day, I decided he would be all right, and got on with the quilting.
At
ten after five, the sun dimmed a bit and I glanced out the window. Over the hill to the northwest, a raincloud
was spilling its moisture all over the valley. I trotted downstairs with
my camera, walked out on the porch to take pictures – and Tiger
trottity-trotted right along with me. If I went down the porch steps,
Tiger came down them after me. If I went back up those steps, Tiger
clambered up the steps after me, even though it’s something of a struggle for the
poor ol’ arthritic kitty. I gave him a treat for his lovableness.
Upon reading this, a friend on an
online quilting group wrote, “Apparently, he needed the exercise and was afraid
you might hurt yourself and no one would be there to help.”
Hee hee, yes, cats are always a great
help and comfort. If you hurt yourself or get sick, they come and stare
into your face with such love and concern.
(Except they’re thinking, Who’s
going to feed me now?!)
Tiger came indoors a
little later and loudly and plaintively informed me that three or four
sprinkles had fallen on his back. However,
near as I could tell, those were the only sprinkles we got; the rest of the
little cloudburst went around us.
Someone from Wal-Mart called at a
quarter ’til 8 p.m. – and I was not surprised, because I knew (by way of the
tracers on his Jeep) that it was the third time Loren had been there in the
space of two hours.
The lady – one of the
managers – told me Loren was there looking for his wife. He said he’d run over her
toes by accident in the parking lot, and then she went off somewhere, and he couldn’t find her, and he thought maybe someone had taken her to the hospital. The lady had called the hospital for him since, as usual,
he didn’t have his cellphone with him. Of course no one named ‘Norma’ was there, whether
sporting squished toes or otherwise.
The lady then spotted
my phone number
in Loren’s
wallet, and called me. I explained
the trouble. She let me talk to him on her
phone. I told him he couldn’t
have run over Norma’s toes, since she has passed away; she’s in heaven (it usually helps to add that last part).
“Everything is okay; you
need to go home,” I said, and then asked if he was feeling all right, and if he’d
be able to get home okay. He was, and he
could; but he didn’t like me telling him that, much.
“Okay,” he said in a peevish tone before handing the phone
back to the manager.
The lady then added her
voice to mine, telling him all was well; he could go home now. That convinced him (it generally helps to add
another voice to the mix), and he went home. I called shortly to make sure he was home and all
right. He was, but he didn’t want to
talk to me.
He said, “I’ll just have
to talk to someone who understands.”
I asked if he wanted to talk to Larry; he said that would be fine.
By the time Larry called
a couple of minutes later, Loren thought he’d been talking with Norma on
the phone, and she’d told him ‘everything is okay’; he’d barely snigged her toes.
“That was Sarah Lynn you
just talked to,” Larry told him. “But
yes, everything is okay; you didn’t run over anyone’s toes.”
(At least, we hope
he didn’t run over anyone’s toes. If he
did, they’re not saying.)
Loren wouldn’t listen to any of Larry’s
reassurances or explanations. Yes, he was too talking to Norma,
and if he’s not married to Larry’s mother, well, then, he’s married to
his sister, and now she’s at her daughter’s (or sister’s, or mother’s,
or granddaughter’s) house.
Finally he said he needed to get some
sleep, so they said goodbye.
It was long past his
usual bedtime. I wonder if he’d gone to
bed once, and dreamed that running-over-the-toes scenario? This happens with those who have Lewy Body
Dementia. They sometimes ‘act out’ their
dreams, either while sleeping, or after awaking.
Siggghhhh... We’ll
laugh later; at the moment, it’s a bit too rattling.
We were thankful for the Wal-Mart manager
who treated all of us so kindly. She could’ve just called
the police, and then there would’ve been a heap more trouble, Loren would’ve gotten
exhausted by the mess, and all of our heads would’ve been spinning. We are thankful it turned out as it did.
Late
that night, I made it to the halfway point on my customer’s Scrappy Time quilt.
I used light turquoise 40-weight
Omni poly-wrapped poly thread on top, and cobalt blue 40-weight Signature
cotton thread in the bobbin. It sure takes a lot more bobbins when I’m
using 40-weight thread, as opposed to the usual 60-weight Bottom Line thread –
but this thread matched perfectly, and that’s the main criterion. The
pantograph is called ‘A Little Bit This’ by Barbara Becker.
Saturday, Loren went to
Wal-Mart again right before 3:00 p.m. He usually remembers that I call
him every day at that time, and that I bring him a meal at about 4:00. Fearing
he might continue the previous evening’s episode, I called Larry. He was in town, so he said he would get Loren
a Subway sandwich, then continue on out to Wal-Mart to look for him.
Larry didn’t find him at the store,
though he saw his Jeep; but after a little while I saw by the tracers that
Loren had gone home, and called to tell Larry.
So he went to Loren’s house, and visited with him for a bit. All seemed to be well. Loren had bought a few groceries, and was
glad for the Subway sandwich.
A couple of hours later, he
called Larry and started off with, “I’m over here in this house I used to own, and I’ve
parked my Jeep in the garage...” (He was in his
very own house, of course, the house he’s lived in for 28 years.)
It was the same song, next verse:
he didn’t know where Norma was.
Larry tried explaining. “My mother passed away –”
Loren interrupted, “No,
I’m not married to your mother, I’m married to your sister!”
After a few more
oddities with which Larry tried to either be helpful or ignore, whichever
seemed best (one can seldom tell what might be best at the
moment), Loren said, “I’ll just have to talk to someone else! You’re all mixed up!”
Before long, he drove west, perhaps
thinking to talk to our nephew and pastor, Robert, or maybe our sister, Lura
Kay. But after traveling only a mile or
two, he evidently changed his mind (or forgot where he was going), turned
around, and went back home.
Meanwhile, Larry brought home the SD card from a new game cam he’d put up out in
the woods where he goes hunting. He
asked me to put it in my laptop so he could look at the deer on my 17.5” screen
instead of his small cellphone screen.
I plugged it in. There were 108 pictures. Three were of Larry setting up the camera and
the deer feeder. Three were of a deer
strolling through (though not paying any attention to the feeder). The rest were multitudes of these
stripey-tailed, masked bandits. 😂 A
couple of the pictures had caught six raccoons all at once. So much for feeding the deer!
That night, on their way back from an
event where they were selling their Lilla Rose hair clips/jewelry, Hannah and
Levi stopped by. Levi had bought
something at another vendor’s booth – with his very own money –and he wanted to
give it to me: this tea towel:
I told Hannah about the recent twubbles
and twials (à la Caleb, age 3) with Loren.
She asked me, “Do you think he’ll need
to go to another home soon?” (meaning, some type of assisted-living home.)
I said, “Well, he already thinks he’s in
another home, so that part’s taken care of.”
And with that, we all burst out
laughing.
See?
I said we’d laugh later!
And ‘later’ wasn’t as long coming as I thought.
It’s better to laugh than to cry about
it; that doesn’t do any good. And
we pray, asking God to help us do and say the right things, and to be cheery
and treat Loren as kind and loving as we would hope to be treated should we ever
be in his circumstances.
One step at a time... one step at a
time...
I finished my customer’s Scrappy Time
quilt that night.
It measures 96” x 112” (there’s quite a bit of this king-sized quilt draped on
the other side of that twin-sized bed).
After the service, Victoria asked us to stop by; she
had steak, potatoes, and carrots in the slow cooker, and had made enough
for us and for Loren too. We picked it
up, played with Carolyn and Violet, and then took Loren the food. We found him sitting on a chair on his back
deck, enjoying the pretty day.
He’s always very appreciative for the food. He thanked us, and asked us to thank Victoria
for him, and even remembered that she is our daughter. I asked him if he was feeling better.
“Oh, I feel fine!” he told me. “I’ve felt good ever
since I woke up!”
Huh. Does that
mean he went back to bed and then got back up after Larry called him?
Then he said, “That’s quite an ordeal to go through,
when you know you aren’t making sense to anyone, and you can’t make it stop.”
!! Wow, that’s the best he’s understood it (or at
least put it into words) in almost two years. Too bad it won’t last. Anyway, we were glad he was {sort of} okay
again, though he did forget to come to the evening church service. Not that we reminded him. On the contrary, we tiptoed softly out of the
house for fear of jarring him back to nonsense.
Later
that day, Jocelyn, Joseph’s wife, sent pictures from a wedding they were
attending. Justin was the ring bearer,
and Juliana was the flower girl.
Loren came here a little after 12:30
p.m. today, looking for Larry. He had a
new pair of canvas and suede work gloves in hand that he thought were Larry’s,
but they were the ones we gave him for his birthday in August. I told him Larry was working, so off he went
to Walker Foundations.
Larry wasn’t at the shop right
then. Loren told our friend who works in
the office that he needed someone to grease something on his John Deere riding
mower. Our friend promised to tell Larry
when he returned; but it would be a while.
Loren wasn’t hungry when I called him
at three, so I said I’d bring his food a little later than usual. Then I rushed off to the post office to mail my
customer’s quilt back to her.
I’d tried hard to stuff it into
a smaller box, even using my vacuum, but couldn’t do it. After endangering ribs and arms and
shoulders, I finally gave up and found a bigger box, only slightly smaller than
the one she had used. So...
instead of the $46 it cost her to send it to me, it ‘only’ cost $43.85. 😑 Shipping prices are too, too high these days.
Home again, I gathered together some food
for Loren and took it to him. There was
chicken breast filet, potato salad, a banana, cottage cheese, pears, Greek
yogurt, and apple juice.
He didn’t seem well. His voice was weaker than usual, and he wasn’t
himself. I hoped the food would help. He’d been better when he came to my house
earlier. Maybe he was bothered because
he hadn’t found Larry, and Larry hadn’t been to his house yet to help with the
tractor? Larry did talk to him on the
phone, telling him he’d come later.
Loren does not really understand that Larry actually has a job, and
works, and gets paid per hour, and doesn’t exactly come and go as he pleases. Well, sometimes he sorta does... but, still,
he is an employee, even if his boss is our nephew.
After giving Loren his food, I put new
batteries in the Moultrie game cam. It’s
so tight I can hardly get it open, and my fingers weren’t tough enough to tighten
the strap and get the camera back in the place it had been. It’s a bit askew now.
Here’s the first picture I took after
Victoria was born that has all nine children in the same shot. It was May 20, 1997; so Victoria was 3 months
old. In the order they are in the
photo: Teddy, 13; Hester, almost 8;
Keith, 17; Hannah, 16; Victoria, 3 months; Lydia, almost 6; Caleb, 3 ½; Dorcas,
14; and Joseph, 12.
 |
| Victoria, 3 months |
Six of our children have anniversaries
in October. I’ve been busy ordering
gifts; everyone is now taken care of except Kurt and Victoria, whose fifth
anniversary is on the 30th.
It’s Keith and Korrine’s third
anniversary in two days – and Korrine just tested positive for Covid this
morning. The girls, Keyara and Kenzie, tested
negative. Korrine doesn’t feel well, and
can only taste food from the sides of her tongue.
I reminded Keith of the time when Lydia
was about 3, and got a bad cold. She was
the only one in the family with it. She
told her Grandma Swiney sadly, “I’m the only one who has a cold! – I must’ve
caught it from my dolly.”
When Larry went to Loren’s house this
evening, he found Loren on his riding mower in the yard. He could see that it was running. Loren saw him coming, and climbed off to tell
him that he thought the pedals must need greasing, because he couldn’t get them
to work, so he couldn’t make it go.
As had happened with his bigger tractor
with the enclosed cab, he had put on the parking brake and forgotten how to
release it. When Larry pointed out the
problem and told him how to release the brake, Loren put a hand to his head in
a ‘Good grief, how could I forget that!’ gesture.
Larry, feeling sorry for him, stayed
and visited for a couple of hours.
Moultrie notified me of new images from the camera when he left. I took a look – and found the camera was still
askew; he’d forgot to straighten it up. Forgetfulness
is contagious, I think.
This is me at age one year, three
months. It was January of 1962.
And now I shall bid you adieu, and good
night. Tomorrow, I scan.
,,,>^..^<,,, Sarah Lynn ,,,>^..^<,,,
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