Journal: From the Nose to the Toes

 

As I was ironing some quilt pieces recently, I now and then bumped into certain pieces of fabric that emitted a fragrance of mothballs when heated, and I knew it came from a bin of fabric my late sister-in-law gave me.  She used to put mothballs in many of her bins and boxes.

Once when I was a little girl, she was pulling some things out of a cedar chest to show me, and it all absolutely reeked of mothballs.

I gagged.

I still remember the look she gave me when I choked, “I’d rather have moth holes in my things, than have it smell like mothballs!”  😆😅

As I was sewing the aforementioned quilt pieces, I put the very last HST section together backwards.  I took it apart, and sewed it back together yet another backwards way.  Would the third time be the charm, I wondered?

Annnd... it was.  I wonder how much faster I’d get quilts done, if I didn’t have a seam or two in nearly every quilt that I have to take out and redo?  Grant’s ‘Consider the Heavens’ quilt took 103.5 hours.  Leroy’s 'The Heavens Declare Thy Glory' quilt took 114.5 hours.

Last Monday evening, I ordered our Christmas cards/pictures from Walmart.  They were having Cyber Monday deals, and it only cost $63 for 180 card/photos.  I saved $27.  Not bad.  I used last year’s picture from Hill City, South Dakota.  We were in a little boutique, back behind some racks of clothes, trying on hats, taking each other’s picture, and giggling like teenagers – when the store owner caught us and offered to take our picture together.  😂  After that, we felt obligated to buy something, so Larry got a vest.  The lady then said we could have one other item at half-price, so we got a similar vest for Caleb, whose birthday would be the following week.

I used PaintShop Pro to put in a background of Molas Lake, Colorado, that I took in 2014.  I wonder if all my friends will laugh at this ‘cowboy’ picture of us the way we laughed years ago when an acquaintance sent us a picture of himself in a Sherlock Holmes deerstalker and trenchcoat?  (And no, he had not intended to emulate the worthy Mr. Holmes; he just thought he looked sharp.)

Tuesday, I heard on the radio that parts of New York State had 60-70 inches of snow!  I pulled up YouTube to see if there were any videos of all that snow – and fell down a rabbit hole of political cyber fisticuffs. 

Yeah, I know; I didn’t have to click on those.  But I did.  It’s always so entertaining, you see.  In the comment section under one video, someone retorted to another, “I refuse to have a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent.”  hee hee

Tuesday, I was just ready to head upstairs to make a pillow for Leroy to match his quilt, when I chanced to turn around and look at the sink.  Aaacckk, it was full of dishes!  Tsk.  How did that happen?

So... I washed the dishes and then went to my sewing room.

I had one extra Whirling Star block that I used for the front of the pillow, and enough scraps of the glow-in-the-dark fabric to make an X on the back, and to incorporate the last little bits into the piping around the edges.  I stuffed it with wool batting, which makes it lightweight and soft.  I’m looking forward to giving the kids their quilts and pillows!

After posting pictures on Facebook, a lady (yes, that one) wrote, “Love the pillow.  Do you do two the same?”

I thanked her and answered, “There’s just one pillow.”

“i alway thought pillows comes [sic] in twos... better than one” she responded in her usual fashion.

“Well, the kid only has one head,” I told her.  “Therefore, he gets one pillow.”

Wednesday, it was 47° at noon, with a windchill of 36°; but when I went out earlier to fill the bird feeders, the sun was shining brightly, and it didn’t feel very cold at all, even though I was in sandals and short sleeves.

A few minutes later, there was a little downy woodpecker on the suet feeder.  They’re the cutest little things.

That day I began wrapping and bagging Christmas gifts.

My newer embroidery/sewing machine wasn’t fixed yet, as the tech was waiting on a part from Switzerland (I think they must send those things on the Mayflower II).  Or was it?  I decided to call Nebraska Quilt Company.  

The lady who answered the phone said, “Let me go downstairs and check...”

The machine wasn’t down there.  She found it on the main floor in the area where the man puts machines he’s finished working on – and no one had bothered to call me!  I wonder how long it’s been there??

That evening was our midweek church service.  Afterwards, the yearbooks were available.  Here’s the page with the Senior Class photos.  Can you see Emma and Nathanael?  That makes five of our grandchildren who have graduated now.

We went to pick up a big grocery order at Walmart after church, and we got Subway sandwiches with a gift card from Keith and Korrine on the way home.  In addition to sandwiches, we got a foot-long churro, a foot-long pretzel, and a foot-long cookie.  The foot-long cookie was not as good as the regular ones.

The temperature was in the 20s, cold enough to keep frozen things frozen, so when we got home, we ate before bringing in the groceries.  My sandwich with the yummy jalapeño peppers gave me a ferocious stomachache.  One of these days I’m a-gonna hafta give those things up.  😢

Then Larry brought in the groceries, and I started putting them away – and discovered that our large order had been made even larger, because we had seven bags of someone else’s groceries in addition to ours.  All of our things were there; nothing was missing.

By this time, the store had closed; so I pulled up a chat to tell them about it.  They told me to keep it all.  “Use it, donate it, or discard it,” said the man I was chatting with.

One time about a year ago, they got my order mixed up with someone else’s.  Some young kid told me to bring it back, when I called.  I did – and they just transferred my stuff and the other lady’s stuff!  Swap-O-Rama.  I don’t imagine the Head Honchos would’ve approved.  The kid was probably in mortal fear of losing his job.

I now have, among other things, three giant bottles of Downy scent beads in various aromas (it was soon so scentful in here, I could practically taste the Downy), turkey franks, TRESemmé hair spray, a smoke detector, Yogurt S’mores Flips, and!!! — International Delights iced mocha coffee made with real cream.  I never get that, because it has 180 calories per 12 oz.  But drink it we did.  (I may have drunk more than my fair share.  Shhhh...) 

There was also some spray-on dry shampoo.  You spray it on dry hair, and then you’ve got squeaky clean tresses, Presto Bingo.  😝😜😖🤪

“Korrine thought that stuff would be the cat’s meow when it first came out,” remarked Keith when I happened to be telling him this, “and, well, not so meowie after all.”  😆

Thursday morning, my nephew Kelvin wrote to tell me that my sister had fallen during the night and had broken her hip.  She would have a partial hip replacement the next day.  Makes me feel so bad, to think of her in pain.  Lura Kay is 20 years older than me.

A cardiologist checked her heart, with which she has had trouble for many years now, and gave the okay for surgery.  That’s the same surgery Loren had a couple of years ago.

I spent the day wrapping and bagging Christmas presents.  I had a little resin cottage with a small clock on the front of it that I’d been wanting to give one of the granddaughters, but it needed a new battery in it.  I tried some time ago to get the back off of the little clock, and failed; so I was inordinately proud of myself when I managed to get it apart, extract the old battery, put in the new, set the time correctly – and it worked!

Eventually realizing I was starving to death, I looked at the clock – and was surprised to find it was 7:35 p.m.

Supper that evening was vegetable/beef stew with almond crackers, potato salad, coleslaw, bananas, and white grape-peach juice.  We had six extra bananas from the groceries that were not ours, so I had a banana with my oatmeal for breakfast a few times last week.

After supper, I went back downstairs to my gift-wrapping room and finished wrapping and bagging everything I could until more gifts arrive.  A couple seem to be hung up in customs.  I hadn’t noticed until I’d already placed the order that they were coming from China.  🫤

Friday morning, I put our bedding in the washing machine, and tried out the Ocean Mist Downy scent beads.  Mmmm, they smelled good.  I also have Lavender & Vanilla Bean and April Fresh.  There are several other Downy products, including dryer sheets; and a Dawn Powerwash dish spray that I’d never even heard of.  According to the instructions, you spray it on dishes that aren’t too dirty, then rinse them off – and abracadabra, your dishes are clean.  Bleah, that doesn’t sound good to me.

At a quarter after 2, Kelvin wrote, “Mama is back in her room.  Surgery went well; she is sleeping right now.”

It was a relief to hear this news.  I didn’t cry when I heard she had fallen; but I cried, upon learning she’d made it through surgery all right.

My reaction to both glad news and sad news has always been ... ... ... Go play the piano!

After the bedding was washed and dried, I remade the bed.  Mmmmm, it smelled delightful.  It was going to be nice climbing into bed that night.

That day, I got started on Levi’s quilt.  This will be made from the partially-done quilt his late paternal grandmother had started putting together.  It was reversible, with the other side looking similar to this one.  She had begun tying it with yarn.

  

I hoped to finish it for one of the grandchildren, but thought it too small.  Those kids just keep on a-growin’! 

Considering the matter, I decided to take the front from the back, enlarge them, and make two quilts from one, for both Nathanael and Levi.

However, I discovered that the big, blunt needle and the thick yarn had left holes in the fabric – and the tie spots were marked with permanent marker.  Fortunately, she had not gotten very far.

 

I began taking both sides completely apart – and found that the seams were sewn with very small stitches, and some were zigzagged tightly.  I sure wasn’t going to rip those seams out, stitch by stitch!

After starting off with my seam ripper, carefully taking out a seam or two, I decided, My time is worth more than whatever the loss of this seam allowance will be if it happens to tear off.  And with that, I got a good grip on the fabric on both sides of the seam, and, while trying to exercise at least some care, tore it apart.  The zigzagged seams, I cut with scissors.

I continued like that through the whole quilt, top and back both, and then steamed and pressed all the pieces.

I will remake the quilts, doing my best to avoid the holes and permanent markings where I can, and camouflaging them and putting a dab of Fray Block on where I can’t.

I won’t be using the fabric with the trees covered with snow, and possibly not the medium-light green.  Now to design some sort of pattern, rummage up some new background fabric, and start putting the first quilt together!

I like these fabrics, and I think it will be special for the boys to have pieces their other grandmother had started putting together in a quilt I finish for them.

“You could appliqué little ‘things’ to cover the marker marks, 😄😄” suggested a quilting friend.

“Larry suggested appliquéing a squirrel in the mouth of that mountain lion,” I told her.  “Aarrgghh, that man.  😜😝😖😧”

Saturday, we went to Nebraska Quilt Company in Fremont to pick up my Bernina, and then continued on to Prairie Meadows to see Loren.  Larry drove, thankfully; my eyes are not behaving well at all.  I told him after last week’s trip that I would not be driving to Omaha again until I have the next Botox treatment.  I had quite a time, trying to keep my eyes open.

It was 62° when we left home, and the clouds were soft and pretty.

We only visited with Loren for half an hour or so.  He was glad to see Larry, and, despite being unable to carry on a conversation most of the time, managed to point at Larry’s boots and ask, “Did you get new boots?”

“No,” answered Larry, “I’ve had them for a while.”  He then talked about brand name and size and comfort and such. 

Later, he told me that those are the boots that used to be Loren’s.  Loren had given them to Larry because they were slightly too big for him.  Larry wonders if Loren remembers something about them.  Could be; but more likely they are just the sort of boot he likes, which is why he bought them in the first place.

I showed Loren pictures of our grandchildren on Instagram, and of our new great-great-nephew who was born last Wednesday.  The baby was named after his paternal great-grandfather who just passed away, Merlin, with his middle name being the name of his maternal grandfather, Charles, my late niece Susan’s husband.  I do not tell Loren about friends and family who have passed away.  There’s no sense in doing that, as he would not remember in any case, but it would make him sad.  He would forget why he was sad – but he’d still be sad.

When the nurses started moving people into the dining room for supper, we departed.  Loren watched us walk away, and watched us as we stood at the nurses’ counter waiting for someone to come unlock the door for us.  I waved at him one last time before the door shut behind us, and he grinned and waved back.  It seemed sad to me, leaving him; I never know if that might be the last time I see him.  He’s frailer than he was last week, and it sounded like he had phlegm in his throat.

We walked out of Prairie Meadows into a beautiful sunset that evening.  

We debated where to go next:  we have gift cards to Bass Pro Shops, Cabela's, Pizza Ranch, Cracker Barrel... and a little dab left on a Panera Bread card.  Not being all that hungry, we chose Panera Bread, thinking to ‘not get much’.

Ha.

We only ordered half-sandwiches and cups (as opposed to bowls) of soup, and we were still stuffed to the gills when we departed.  I got Hearty Fireside chili, and Larry got Homestyle chicken noodle soup.  I ordered Spicy Chicken Ciabatta Dipper half-sandwich, which comes with a little bowl of Creamy Tomato soup to dip it in.  

Larry ordered a French Ciabatta Dipper half-sandwich, and it comes with Bistro French Onion soup to dip it in.

I’m such a brave person, choosing all that hot, spicy stuff after the dreadful stomachache I got Wednesday night from eating a chicken teriyaki sandwich with jalapeño peppers!  😂  I love hot and spicy things  – but my stomach does not always approve.  This time, though, I was fine, other than being too full. 

Larry ordered Blueberry Lavender lemonade, and I picked Pomegranate Hibiscus tea.  Larry brought the drinks to the table, set them down – and we couldn’t tell whose was whose.  We tasted each of them, and then after a few sips, I took the blander of the two in the hopes that it would be soothing.  Larry liked the tarter one in any case.  Looking at the colors of the drinks online, I’m a-thinkin’ we somehow wound up with the drinks we each had intended to get in the first place.  Lemonade would be tarter than tea, right?  I went back later for a refill, and, unable to find the Pomegranate Hibiscus tea, got Passion Papaya iced green tea instead. 

Whew, it was much sweeter than the first drink I had, telling me we did indeed have the right drinks, because the Pomegranate Hibiscus tea had only 15 calories per 20 fluid oz., while the Passion Papaya iced green tea had 150 calories per 20 fluid oz.  Larry’s Blueberry Lavender lemonade, on the other hand, had 220 calories per 20 fluid oz.!

Oh, and the Panera Bread gift card?  It had $1.18 on it.  😅

When we got home, Larry carried my sewing machine upstairs for me.  I plugged it in and gave it a try.  It seems to be working properly again, thankfully.  I attached the embroidery module and got it ready to make quilt labels.  I’ll do that tomorrow.

Sunday morning at 9:00 a.m., it was chilly, just 31°, with a windchill of 24°; but the high was expected to be 59°.  I was about to say there wasn’t a cloud in the sky, but I glanced out the window, and spotted a small wispy cloud way off to the west.

Late that afternoon before our evening service, I texted Victoria to ask if they could use the large jar of Skippy creamy peanut butter we’d gotten in that mistaken grocery order.  She said they could.

“Okay, I’ll bring it,” I told her.  “You want me just to lob it into your pew as I go by?” 

hee hee

I gave the spray-on dry shampoo to my niece Christine, in case it might come in handy for my sister as she recovers from the broken hip.

There’s also a 30-oz. jar of light mayonnaise that we got with those groceries.  So far, nobody I’ve asked wants it.  We don’t care for it much; we like light Miracle Whip a whole lot better, and don’t use much of that, either.  I don’t mind mayonnaise in deviled eggs.

Hmmm... I wonder how many deviled eggs one could make with a 30-oz. jar of mayonnaise?

Okay, one needs about a third cup of mayonnaise for a dozen deviled eggs.  There are six cups of mayonnaise in a 30-oz. jar.  That means I could make 18 dozen deviled eggs!

Nope.  Níl, nyet, non, nein, neyn, nosiree.

It was 45° and sunny by noon today, with a windchill of 32°, though it was bright and sunny.  We might see some flurries tomorrow.

One of the delayed Christmas presents arrived today.  Hopefully, the other box will be here soon.

For supper tonight we had the turkey franks that we got by accident with the other person’s order.  I hardly ever buy hotdogs of any kind, though if I do, I usually get turkey franks, as I figure they’re more healthful than pork hotdogs.  I slit them down the middle, broiled them, then stuck a fat sliver of string cheese in them, and popped them back into the oven for a bit with some Nature’s Own Perfectly Crafted Brioche-Style hotdog buns we got last night.  

When the cheese was melted, they were done.  I like hotdog buns toasted and buttered, and a little bit of ketchup, mustard, and relish on the hotdog.  Larry leaves off the butter, and has more generous helpings of the condiments.  He had two dogs; I had one.  We also opened up a jar of Victoria’s yummy home-canned pickles.

We topped off the meal with yogurt and fruit juice.  Not the most healthful meal I’ve ever fixed; but I reckon it wasn’t too awful.  A little light on the vegetables.  That big, spicy pickle was a vegetable, wasn’t it?  Well, wasn’t it??

Nope, a pickle – and a cucumber – is a fruit.  So is a tomato.  Look it up if you don’t believe me.  And see that you use a reputable website.  😄

Tomorrow, we shall eat vegetables.

Ugh, I just heard a rattly ol’ truck heading up the hill on Highway 81, half a mile to the north – and now the house is full of the smell of half-combusted diesel exhaust.  Ugh, ugh, ugh.  It’s so strong, it’s burning my eyes, nose, and throat!  Time out while I go open some windows and turn on a fan to air the place out.

It’s rare that we ever smell exhaust from the highway; but when we do, it’s not one bit pleasant.  It happens when the wind (or lack thereof) and atmosphere are just right to force the fumes up and over the hill to the north, and then let them drop down and settle right on our house.  One cold winter a few years ago, the house reeked of fumes for a week or more before there was enough of a breeze to blow them away.  Ugh, that made me sooo sick.

Well, opening windows and the front door only helped for a minute or two.  Just a moment while I open more windows and turn up the heat.       

To make matters a little more tricky, I’m limping around with a cane, because a while ago I started trotting into the laundry room to turn off the light somebuddy had left on, and my bothersome eyes closed just as I was going through the hallway by the back door.  Well, I know how to walk through my own house, even if my eyes are shut, now don’t I?

Except... the wooden trashcan jumped out in my way, and I kicked it.  Now the fourth toe on my left foot is setting up a howl.  I don’t think it’s broken; I’ve broken toes before, and this doesn’t feel that bad.  Still, I’m glad I have a cane.

The trashcan did not offer any apologies.

Well, I’ll be seein’ ya.  I need to ask the butler to make me a deviled egg.

,,,>^..^<,,,          Sarah Lynn           ,,,>^..^<,,,