Home mathematics is different than routine math. Here's how it works:
1 banana can be turned into 12 muffins...or ONE fourth breakfast for a ravenous 3-year-old boy.
1 muffin can become 200,436 crumbs in the right pair of small hands and though confined to the dining room table to eat, may also be spread over roughly 900 sq. ft. of open space.
Hello dears. I know, I know, I said I wouldn't write this week much and I don't mean to do so but I am for the moment. I am writing this at a bit before 6pm on Christmas Day. I have reason to write. For one thing, it has been a pleasant and lovely day.
I now understand why those of you who live in more northern climes might well think the weather outside enticing and windows should be thrown open once a high of 40F makes itself felt. I went out earlier today in the sunshine, with a mild westerly, cold, breeze blowing and almost felt inclined to take a sunbath...but then a sharper breeze blew. I decided it was worthwhile to go back indoors, lol. At that point it was in the mid-30s but for a moment or three it felt positively balmy compared to what it had been the two days previous.
In my home this week, it occurs to me that I've put off as long as I might the planning of the weekend ahead. We're having a family gathering and at the moment of this writing, I've no clue what I'm going to have to eat. Since roughly 6 meals will likely be wanted and there shall be at least 8 children and upwards of 6 adults in the house it would be worthwhile to get busy with the planning and gathering of foods. Yet here I am with no idea.
I don't think I have ever been so unprepared for a big weekend in my home.
Saturday: Writing this on Sunday. I was absolutely done in by the time we arrived home on Saturday and unable to formulate thoughts into physical words. Supper was cooked for me. I'd insisted on takeout but was vetoed and in the end, we used what we had purchased at the grocery and added in two items from the Dollar store in town since Aldi had none of those two items in stock. It was lovely. Yes, clearing up was mine to attend to but that was fine.
But that was the back end of the day. Let me move all the way back to Friday night. First, we had a small one to deliver to a parent. After the swap off, we stopped and got pizza for our supper. That's two Friday nights in a row with that and I will admit they were very good. Homemade pizza dough is good but there's an airiness to pizzeria dough that I have yet to achieve with my homemade dough. I do see that the simpler toppings are the better the pizza seems to taste. And that a thicker crust, not as thin as I stretch it here at home, is tastier. Oh yes, and that Marinara is the best sauce.
In my home this week, do you remember the song by Herman Hermits, "Henry the VIIIth I am"? After the first verse is over, the singer says, "Second verse, same as the first." That's how I feel the entire month has been thus far. It's more about what I didn't get done than about what I actually accomplish. It's about what I keep thinking I'd normally do but don't have time for or patience enough for or mental space to give. I attempted to order one, the only one gift I was going to order, but John disliked every single version of the gift I found. Each had something he disliked about it. I gave up.
Never mind.
Saturday: I swear that since the first of November we have been in the most frustrating holding pattern of all time. Well, no, not of all time, but it's a continuation of something I've noted in our lives in the past. The waiting room is a long session where one season is neither here nor there and the other is nowhere to be seen.
This pattern started about the end of October. We were waiting for Katie to move and then getting the house up on the market. We've waited and waited for various things related to the house, waited to know who was coming for Thanksgiving, waited to do Christmas shopping, waited to know when we might gather as a family. Today we are waiting to see if the promised repair man is going to show, and if we get to attend the Christmas program at church for which we have tickets. As it's now 11:30am, its looking like we're going to just be hanging in mid-air. We're also waiting to see if family returns tonight or if it will be sometime tomorrow. We don't know a thing! And it is soooo frustrating.
Hello dears. Do come in. Won't you have a nice warm drink? I have Christmas blends of coffee: Santa's White Christmas and a Vanilla Caramel blend and oh yes, that Peppermint blend that Samuel bought for me last winter. I feel the need of something festive, whether I'm in the festive mood or not. Won't you have some with me and let us sit down and have a heart to heart today?
Autumn is nearing an end and Winter will soon be here. I think people mentally accept winter's beginning as December 1. Thanksgiving, which seems such an autumnal celebration for us here in the States, is over. December ushers in winter. This year the leaves were on the ground, no longer fluttering upon the trees well before December 1. We've had frost and honest to goodness cold and somehow it feels winter has already arrived. It's not a solstice thing. It's a recognition of seasonal signs really. People are ready for the next thing, aren't they? For the gifting season and the turning of the old year into a new one.
In my home this week, I am waiting. We are currently waiting on a local man who apparently works on plumbing. He said he 'might' come out today. No hurry...It's just cold showers and heating water on the stove.
We are waiting on many things. People to set dates for finishing up things. To be paid. To see if we can actually go to the Christmas program for which we have tickets or if we shall have to forfeit them. To see how long I must put off Christmas gift shopping...And more.
Saturday: I was scrolling through a blog this afternoon and saw photos of Christmas cocoa stations. For the first time I felt twinges of interest in Christmas decorating. I thought of how much I'd like to create such a station in my own kitchen. I probably won't, since it would take space, I don't have at present, but I thought about it and was interested.
That made me feel a bit restless, and I went off to my room and picked up my Bible and began a self-guided study on the birth of Christ. I began with Matthew 1. I didn't get to dig and do research, but I have begun and will take time over the days ahead to study further. I find that in times of trouble, while I might instinctively want to hide, that it is always best to not turn away from God but turn inward towards God and hide within Him. I can do this by prayer, study and reading His word.
In my home this week, I am trying again.
Pilar brought me a lovely red sweater for holiday wear, and it came in a cute Christmas shopping bag. The front of the bag was a checklist: Nice/Naughty/I Tried My Best. It was the last that was checked. I laughed, a rueful laugh for sure, but a laugh, nonetheless. I feel like I've done nothing but 'Try My Best' all year long and I'm uncertain I've done a thing right or well. John has a saying, "Almost only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades." And we all know that in either one, you lose.
But I keep trying. "E" for effort, right?
Saturday: We had Caleb today. We were a little nervous about this since the day also involved meeting John's brother and sister-in-law for a meal out. Needn't have worried. Caleb was as quiet as a mouse and perfectly well behaved. And why? Because we took the Kindle with us, connected into the restaurant's Wi-Fi, and pulled up a Spider Man cartoon, a most recently discovered obsession that none of us were aware even existed in his little life. Worked like a charm!
It's been a very quiet day overall which has been appreciated in many ways but also a sad sort of day, too. John never does goodbye very well and to say goodbye to his brother today was difficult. I think he had bleary eyes all the way home. He talked as though he was afraid this was the last time he'd see George. His brother is in perfectly good health, but he is 76 and I guess at this stage of life, we all must expect that eventually our age will catch up with us.
I was watching a vlog the other day and the narrator found the most stunning grove of trees in a park. They were such beautiful colors! She said, "I wondered what it would be like to just see things in black and white..." and then that portion of the film was in black and white. The wonder and awe of the scene dulled.
I remember as a child, we watched tv in black and white. I was in third grade when we got our first color tv, but a lot of reruns of old programs and movies were still shown in black and white. And most all of the photos in our photo albums were black and white.
So how did it go? In the end, did I follow my rules for Thanksgiving 2022?
Every year, as we end a holiday, I make a few notes of what worked and what didn't. I usually do this in my general homemaking pages of my personal notebook and not online, but since I was so bold as to profess my "Survival Plans..." for this Thanksgiving, I thought I'd be equally as bold and tell you how those plans went.
Menu: I stuck to my menu plan. I did make one concession for an onion allergy, so I mixed up a portion of dressing without onions and set aside a portion of the green bean casserole mixture without any added onions. I topped that with cracker crumbs. Might as well have let it stand as I was informed by the one with the allergy that it's more a dislike and if they are cooked in smaller pieces, he didn't mind them so much. Live and learn.