Heat Waves, House Guests and Chronic Pain

I see that it has been a long time since I posted. The weeks flew by, punctuated by heat waves during which I mostly stay away from my computer. The house heats and heats and finally feels like it is going to explode. Then it cools. Relief that I can almost feel in the rafters.

My family visited briefly. The visit was marred by a heat wave! We are just finishing one now. The days are shorter, so the heat is not so oppressive and the fall light and colors give the experience a different quality from the high heat of summer. Somehow, with the knowledge that winter is coming, the heat is not so difficult to bear or so oppressive.

This morning as I looked out of my bedroom window I saw a trio of great red globes hanging low on my neighbor's pomegranate tree. Beautiful, beautiful fruit of fall.

Chronic pain has been plaguing me for month. A combination of sciatica, spinal stenosis and arthritis. I think that, with the help of the web, I am finally getting the positioning of pillows and bolsters arranged just so and the morning pain is lessening. The web has also yielded information about herbal and homeopathic remedies that are helping somewhat.

I am waiting for a package that contains a bottle of MSM, a supplement that I wish I had known about earlier. It will be interesting to see if it lives up to its reputation.

Gratitude filled my heart this morning when the pain on arising was not so bad. It is a beautiful day and the hummingbirds are feeding on the pineapple sage. My favorite time of the year. So I will hang on the gratitude and let it carry the day.

Fall Activities

Today was crisp and clear after a day of rain yesterday. The sky was blue as blue and the leaves, sparser on the trees now after the storm, ran the gamut of yellows, oranges, and reds that make Fall such an outstanding season of light and color.

It is cold enough to think of a cozy fire, of baking and cooking slow steaming things like pot roasts and soups. My activities were more prosaic, setting up shop for my small business. Here are pictures.



The picture above shows my I Keep Advent banner. (Other banner designs are on the rack behind it.) My cards, the peace design that I have written about, designs for Christmas, and all occasion blank notes with many, many flower images comprise the offerings here along with a basket of lovely cards from my friend and colleague, Fe Langdon.



Above one of my hand knitted shoulder shawls, that can also be worn as a head scarf is draped on a wig stand. Two more are in plastic bags next to it. The yarns are soft, hand painted natural fibers.



More banners in the photo above, this time with the peace design on top of the stack and two baskets, one holding peace buttons and gift tag sized cards, the other holding sachets sit on another small table. It is fitting to display the peace design, which I made in honor of Papa with the sachets for herbal crafts were part of the business that he helped me with when he was alive.



Next, in the photo above are a selection of the hand made boxes that I began making last summer. They are fun to make. Some are printed with the same designs that I am using on other items; some are fabric over paper. I love making them almost as much as I love to knit, although arthritis and post-polio syndrome are slowing down my hands. (Some days I feel as though I live on Acetaminophen and Ibuprofen--well and of course, chocolate.)

Finally on the kitchen counter, I have arranged a display of my Mary Kay products. I was disappointed with the picture though, because I had the brilliant idea to use my Pampered Chef cooling rack to display some of the items and it works really well.



I am grateful for how pretty my things look all nicely displayed, for the customers who do find me from time to time and for my dear friend who came and swept all the leaves away and neatened and tidied the front walk way and the patio so that all would be ready for people to come.

Fall for Sure

It was 59 degrees inside my house when I got up this morning. The electric blanket had quit doing the job--for some reason the newer blankets take their cue from the ambient temperature of the air above them rather than from the control setting. Probably will have to break down and learn to use that other technology that I insisted to my late father that we had to have when we put in the "new" furnace--eleven years ago. That is the programmable thermostat. The one year I used it though, I hated it. It came on way too early, went off too early in the evening and I had to keep remembering to reset it anyway in between, just as I do now. Still it did keep the furnace from coming on at night and blowing 60 degree air at me.

It is time to bake bread and make soup--warm the kitchen with the cooking projects and be comforted by "hot cooked food"--an expression of Papa's that I love. I do wish that I had a winter garden and hope to have one next year.

Rain is on the horizon, but this is the fourth week in a row that we have had that forecast and we haven't had much more than enough drizzle to dampen the ground. We would give thanks for a good soaking rain or three or four.

The sun is definitely at a lower angle these days and I find myself counting the days until the winter solstice and then the light will come again. It is a good time for drawing in and being grateful for home and hearth--which I surely am.

Very hard to believe that next week is already Thanksgiving. (Sorry about the typos that I just corrected.

Sunday in October

The weather has taken a winterish turn. Overcast and damp, it could be any time of day and much more deeply into winter than it is on this second October Sunday. We are waiting the arrival of a storm. While we are desperately in need of rain, we aren't in need of the wind that is supposed to accompany it. This is always a little scary. The first goodly storm of the season tends to run off since the earth is hard packed and dry from all the baking summer sun. In addition, the power lines are dusty and the rain seems to have the effect of causing this dust to turn to muck and the power lines to short. I hope that we will get the good effects and the bad will be minimized. May the trees stand tall and the power stay on.

Time to remember where I put my long underwear shirts after no longer needing them for the year back in June. Time to hand wash all the hand knitted things that I should have washed by now when the weather was warmer! (I am a champion procrastinator.)

Good weather for baking though and for soup. I will use up all those cans and boxes of soup. (It feels almost as strange to say boxes as it does to pour the soup out of them, but that is a definite advance in technology! No more can openers. No more depending on power to open the cans, either, come to think of it. My hands will no longer work a hand opener.)

Yesterday I made a small batch of booklover's sachets. I love the smell of the patchouli, rosemary and cloves mixed together. So yummy. And no calories. (I should invent a chocolate and vanilla potpourri, but that would make me want to bake.)

Pictures to take, that should have been taken yesterday--when the light was better. Natural light is always better.

Still, it is Sunday. Time to relax and pray, give thanks and count my blessings. I am grateful today that the hot weather is behind us and that when I look at my Etsy shop I see that some of my items have been viewed many times. I wonder, what to do to convert the views to clicks?

Prayers for all my family and friends--and viewers and readers. May your day be truly blessed. (That underlined for was originally a typo--I thought for and typed to. Guess I shouldn't blog on only one cup of coffee. Yes, proofreading would help too.

Coming Back from Vacation

I have had company for the last week. A delightful visit from my sister and her husband from Toledo, Ohio via Phoenix, Arizona where they visited their son, daughter-in-law and grandson in time for their grandson's second birthday. My sixty-second birthday was celebrated Wednesday.

It has been lovely to have this time away from routine, to eat with family and friends and to play Scrabble and watch movies. (I laugh that I may have the greatest shrink wrapped collection of video tapes on the planet. One of those tapes, Tea with Mussolini came out of its wrap yesterday and my sister and I enjoyed watching it together.

We watched several other movies and that gave me practice in finally using the DVD/VCR unit that I bought a year and half ago, but hadn't mastered using! Now I must watch more movies so that I don't forget how to do it.

My sister and I cleared a chest of drawers and she moved it to its new spot in the sewing room, aka Master Bedroom, which I hope I will finally have rearranged between now and Christmas. That will be the completion of a two-year project.

I need to get back to work and hope that the last heat wave of 2009 hit us last weekend. The computer and I both seem to like cooler weather better than hot.

The Fall is really here with crisp mornings, sunny afternoons and the pineapple sage in full bloom outside the kitchen window. My sister and I both love looking at the hummingbird as she feeds on that blooming plant.

More to come, I hope now that summer and vacation are behind me.

I am so grateful for my family and for their visit and praying for safety for travelers as they return home.

Tasks That Didn't Exist When I Was Young

Maybe I am just getting old and grumpy, or maybe it is just beginning to show a bit more. Yesterday, as I shredded paper and washed plastic bags I thought of tasks that didn't exist when I was growing up.

Recycling.

There wasn't so much packaging for starters. If you needed to buy a pencil, you went to the store and bought a pencil. (I still remember buying my artist's blue pencils for calligraphy layout as singles. Several sizes of leads, but one of each. Not packs. I still have the pencils.) If you needed screws or nuts or nails, you went to the hardware store and bought what you needed out of bins. There were no blister packs and the sacks that they came home in were made of paper, easily burnable in the coal furnace in the basement.

True, crayons came in sets in boxes, but the boxes had no other packaging, not even a sticker to keep them closed. Nobody would have swiped one crayon.

Plastic bags hadn't been invented yet. Our mothers made our sandwiches for us to take for lunch and slipped them into wax paper sandwich bags. Milk was delivered in glass bottles and the bottles, washed, were put back in the milk box on the back porch so the milk man could take them when he brought the new full ones.

We rarely drank soda, but when we did, it came home in glass bottles that had a deposit on them, so we took them back to the store. Sometimes, in the summer, kids collected bottles in the their red wagons to take back to the store to earn money for the ice cream man or some other small kid expense. The newspapers were tied up in bundles because sooner or later there would be a paper drive by the Boy Scouts to earn money for the troop. This was a vestige of paper drives during the war years when nothing was wasted.

Washing everything before it is recycled.

Obvious. There wasn't so much stuff; we threw out the trash and we didn't wash it first.

Sorting the recycling.

How many hours have I spent doing this in the last twenty years? I am so grateful to be able to read newspapers and magazines online now so that everything that I read doesn't have to be handled so many times before it clears the house.

Shredding paper

This one didn't exist a few decades ago either. The noise made from the shredder is about as pleasant as a leaf blower. One small good note of the recession is that at least there isn't as much junk mail this year as in the preceding years. I can at last catch up with all the paper shredding. Didn't even own a shredder until two years ago. After spending time sorting the recyclable parts (envelopes and such) from the shreddable parts of the junk mail, I find that I then spend about as much time cleaning the stuck paper bits out of the shredder so that I can feed it some more, as I do actually feeding paper through it. Definitely not time well spent.

Washing plastic bags to use them again.

This was one that I used to refuse to do. Yesterday, after cleaning three kitchen drawers, I found that I had the equivalent of a box full of zipper type plastic bags. All gently used since the really gunky ones had made it to the trash. So along with the dishes, I am washing the bags. (That will mean fewer boxes cluttering the pantry and fewer boxes to break up to recycle. Maybe there is more method to this than I thought.)

I have found that the easiest way to do this and to ensure that they will dry is to put soapy water in the bag, close the bag, shake and squish. Transfer the soapy water to the next bag or the dishpan to be used to wash the next thing and turn the bag inside out. Rinse it. When it has dried, turn it right side out again and dry the outside. Store open so that it will be easier to use the next time.

How much water, energy (to heat the water as well as our own energy) and dish soap does it take to reclaim the plastic bags and rinse out the recyclables? How much time do we spend doing these seemingly useless, less than productive tasks?

Still, I am grateful that I am getting things cleaned up. Even more grateful for the visit of my sister and brother-in-law that I am anticipating in two weeks. (The motivator for the clean-up.) Grateful too for the beautiful fall weather that we are having and the energy it gives me to do the clean-up.

Rejoicing over Something Geeky

Last night I went to bed happy, truly happy for the first time in a very long time. I actually got something geeky that I had been trying to make work for months to work! Hurrah! Wheelchair version of a happy dance! I can, I can, yes I can!

So after all of that you may be wondering what it was. How to place a code in such a way that it will affiliate link to my cafepress shop so that someone can become an affiliate and ask all their family and friends to come see what I have to offer, thus bringing them income along with me. Hurrah!

This is different from the link on the right which goes to my shop and just makes money for me--not enough traffic this way. So I am hoping, hoping and hoping and now I have to figure out the next steps.

It was cold this morning and the only reason that I finally got up was that it wasn't even very warm in my bed, so I had to get up and turn up the heat. I am not looking forward to winter despite the fact that I basically like it. I like drawing in, having the privacy that comes with closing the windows and not hearing what everyone else is doing. I love the winter baking warmth and smells in my house and the smells of soups and chili cooking.

I totally love Christmas and the preparation for it that is Advent. Valentine's day is fun too and of course, by then in my part of the country, spring will be on it's way.

So having done my geeky thing, I am resting on my laurels today. I go to play with plants and to inventory pots for the bulbs that have been waiting to be potted. Over the weekend basil will be harvested and I hope that pumpkin muffins will be baked--if I can find my recipe.

I am grateful.

Tempus Fugit!

It's hard to believe it is Tuesday already. The time is going by too fast and this is my favorite time of year. I love the low angle of light in the fall, the sense of a pause after the too long days of summer, the heat and the routines of survival I must go into when heat waves strike. Now it is neither too hot nor too cold. I know that I have survived the summer and I do not yet have to hunker down and worry about how I will manage during the winter.

The house is still cleaned up and therefore friendlier than before I had company, so I am still benefiting from their visit. (The fact that my sister left my fridge and freezer well-stocked is a blessing too.)

A month from today is the election that seems to have been going on forever. The bailout so much touted and so hurriedly passed, does not seem to be working. The stock that I need to sell to pay my way through the winter is down a frightening amount. At the same time, the worry about finances seems to hang like a heavy mist before a storm, casting a pall of doom over the beautiful fall day. I am determined not to watch the news, for it is all bad. I do hope that Obama is elected in a month and that he does bring the energy, intelligence, hope and common sense that he seems to carry to the actual job of leading this country.

For the decline of the stock market is relative. We don't hold money in our hands that we have in our names on paper only--unless of course it is our savings accounts. I have believed for ten years that the value of our economy is inflated and for twenty years that supply side economics pays out only to the rich. It looks like I was right. (I just wish that I had a little more money in hand at the moment.)

So back to work to see what I can do to earn some. Before I know it time will have flown to November and a new round of bills. I am grateful for the beautiful day, the lovely light and that at least for this month every thing is paid.

Fall is Here!

It feels like fall is really here! The angle of the light has changed and it is fully dark much earlier now. I began the day watching a hummingbird sipping at the pineapple sage outside the kitchen window, went outside to play with plants and the Fed Ex man arrived with my Pampered Chef order--three new gadgets that are sturdily made tools.

Then I was blessed with lunch from a friend. What I had thought would be a day of work has gone by quickly as a day of play and that is a blessing. Enough time later in the week for work, I am savoring my favorite season and a day to just be relaxed.

This week a friend sent me what may be the most wicked and dangerous recipe ever invented. The 5 minute chocolate microwave mug cake. I thought, "naw this isn't going to work." My mind kept coming back to it until finally I had to try it. (You can google for a zillion variations of it.) I stirred it up in an extra large mug--one of my own designs from Cafepress--and put it in the microwave for three minutes.

For the first minute or so nothing seemed to be happening and then a chocolate pouf rose above the mug and hovered. It extended to the point that I thought it was going to touch the ceiling--and make a mess. Just missing that point it began to collapse and stayed at a certain height above the mug until the microwave shut off and then it disappeared as though the mug had swallowed it up. I was disappointed that it didn't stay high, but grabbed a towel and removed it.

I began eating it from the mug, but quickly realized it wasn't going to cool fast enough so put it out on a plate. It held it's shape quite well and was delicious. The mug took a really long time to cool, though and I find that scary from the standpoint of doing this at all regularly.

The cake, about the size of two cupcakes, was really two portions and I was pleased that I could not eat it all in one sitting.

Cooking and baking are two of the pleasures of cooler weather. I am feeling gratitude tonight. Think that I will make another one sometime this week.

Cold and crisp

I think fall is definitely turning into winter. It is decidedly cold in the mornings and this old body doesn't want to rise and shine!

The dryer repair man came and determined nothing wrong with the new dryer. One circuit breaker had popped, giving the dryer less voltage to work on. It is now running with the smallest load I could set up in it--hand towels. I'm betting it has popped the breaker again and will not dry the towels. Next call--the electrician. Oh, and the dryer vent cleaner cleaned the vent yesterday--guess what, it didn't need cleaning!

The hand towels can be strung out above the washer and dryer, if they come out wet. Clothes and sheets cannot. It is at moments like this that I find it difficult to find my blessings and be grateful. Life with a disability is not easy. That's an understatement. Yes, it certainly is. More assistive technology would be a blessing. Fewer restrictions on earnings for the disabled who, because of the nature of our health care payment system must rely on Social Security benefits, would also be a blessing, and in fact are a necessity.

Why can disabled persons who are blind have a substantial gainful activity level of $1500 per month while the "non-blind" can only earn $950 before losing benefits? Why is this income level not calculated as after tax rather than before tax? Wouldn't it make infinitely more sense to simply allow disabled people to work up to 22 hours per week, keep their benefits and be paid what is usual and customary for whatever type of work they are doing?

Wouldn't it also make marvelous sense to train people at their real skill level, recognize and encourage work-at-home possibilities (that are real and not scams) and help people find them? Many of the able-bodied "telecommute". Why shouldn't I? In a sense I am doing so right now, writing this blog post, shopping for supplies for my small business, tending cafepress/margueritemanor.com and my Squidoo lenses.

In addition to three degrees from "world-class" or "first tier" universities I also have a myriad level of computer skills, design skills adn people skills that are underutilized. I need mentoring and networking and this should be part of vocational rehabilitation.

If there is any candidate for president who wants to take up the needs of the disabled, I will vote and campaign for that person (provided the rest of what he or she advocates isn't too far from what I too, believe). So far I don't see or hear anything that suggests the issue is even on the political radar. Disabled people vote. Our family members vote. Our caregivers and helpers vote. Even our neighbors and friends vote. That is a lot of people, a lot of votes.

I hadn't meant to be political today, but here it is. I think I may have said it before. I will say it again, I am sure.

The sun shines in and that is a blessing. The dryer is heating and that too is a blessing. Now I can do laundry again. (If the washing machine will just hold up!) Praise and thank God!

November and it is Going By Too Fast!

November 5 already! Whew, the time really is flying by. The leaves have turned. I love the golden and red light of autumn, the pumpkins and other squashes and the turning in. At the same time, because I live in California, I have the pleasure of going outside and watching the birds who still forage in my yard. Yesterday I watched while the hummingbird came bey and fed all around the big pineapple sage that grows on my porch. Just two years ago that was two cuttings from the bush in the back that we were not even sure would survive over the window. (It scan now be seen easily from the kitchen window.) M's kind care has made my plants grow and L continues the tradition for me.

My biggest project over this weekend was to copy files from the "big guy" or desk top computer to the laptop and then upload the images to AdoramaPix for printing. I happily await the email that says my prints are on the way. These will be made into cards for sale through this blog, I hope on Etsy--if I ever, ever get that up and running and through little boutiques at my house. So if you need cards--peace, flowers, Christmas, please keep checking back.

It is fun to review the photos and designs that I have made over the last two years. Papa shared his considerable knowledge and interest in photography with me all those years ago when I was growing up. A Mark IV little box camera was my first ever camera, followed by a beautiful Retina (used adn reconditioned, my graduation present from High School), followed by a Kodak Instamatic because the Retina had jammed and we couldn't get it repaired. Finally, nearly three years ago I invested in a beautiful digital camera and will write more about it later.

Backing up the files from a digital camera is one step in good disaster preparedness, as I believe that I have written in posts regarding my computer crash. Computers are subject to their own topical disasters as well as the natural disasters that can befall everything else.

Since November is the month of remembrance and one turns to looking at photo albums as one remembers and reminisces, I think it is also a good time to think about how to share and back-up family photos.

Some, a great many, in fact have been scanned and can be shared either on CD's or through file-sharing sites. I will be exploring what Adorama offers in this regard as well as other options and will report back.

Saturday Fun

When I was growing up (in the house that I still live in) Fall Saturdays where devoted to yard work, garage chores and later baking as the holidays drew near. Today I combined all three with nostalgia and the help of a friend. The baking came first--I made brownies as cupcakes from a mix to decorate tomorrow with Halloween decorations given to me by a friend last weekend. Then, as I settled down to wait on hold for Big Ugly Cable Company to not answer the phone, a friend arrived and began whacking bushes. While I waited she whacked and filled my large yard toter for recycle. I did nothing but wait. Disgusted with BUCC and not wanting to miss the opportunity to visit with my friend, I hung up the phone, grabbed the garage key and wheeled outside. There was something I wanted from the garage, which I cannot enter so I wanted to make the most of the chance to ask for help. My friend obliged. I did not have what I wanted but she began to eye various piles and heaved objects around and eyed certain shelves. As she held things up for me to view, she said things like, "Do you want this?" "I can make it disappear." (She is an expert recyclers and drives a mini-van.) The upshot? A much tidier quadrant of my garage and many things on their way to the recycle. Just like old times--baking, yard and garage. I was reminded of my father as we sorted. He had saved scrap-metal intending to recycle it. Now it will go where it can be reused. he also saved spark plugs. There appears to be no way to recycle them. Sigh. If my sister and I had known about his cache, we would have buried one with him--or maybe a handful. That makes me wonder what future archaeologists several centuries hence would think finding spark plugs where someone had been buried. Maybe I should try to make a short story out of it. It was a fun day and I am grateful, as I always am for the friendship of this strong, smart woman. (She even found a tool that she could not identify. I didn't think such a thing existed on the face of the earth.) May she live long and prosper!

Monday again. Disaster preparedness

How can the time be going by so fast? I know, I know, it's creeping old age. The fall weather has become warm and brought firestorms to southern California. This is always so sad to see. If I had not flipped channels to the news last night at 10pm, but simply gone directly to bed, I wouldn't have seen anything about it until this morning.

How does the news influence our lives? Do most people have it on as a constant backdrop? I don't, but I rarely miss checking it once a day either on television or on the internet. Does it really help me to know and does it help the people to whom it is happening that I know? I sit here and ponder these questions and wonder further if the quesions themselves have any use. Sometimes the outpouring of charity after a disaster, especially a spectacular disaster, does help, of course. That outpouring would not occur if it were not for the news. Still, I wonder. The does the news make us voyeurs in other people's tragedy and sorrow?

How does this relate to a Christian life, a spiritual or contemplative life? On the one hand, I think it moves us to compassion for those in the news and to pray for them as though they were members of our families. It also moves us to send aid.

On another level, it may also remind us to take care and make our own preparations. Is the house and content insurance adequate for the area where I live? Do I have important and necessary documents, house title or mortgage, insurance policies, bank and credit account information stored in a safe place? Are business documents backed up and stored? What about family pictures? Pictures can be stored online and are much easier to share this way. Pictures that constitute a household inventory and a memory album of family treasures and heirlooms can be stored this way too.

Well, I didn't start out to write this, but this is what came out today. I hope it will be useful and I pray for the firefighters and people in southern California.

Sunday again

October is going by too quickly! Two weeks and it will be Halloween. The weather is definitely winterish and I am digging out the woollies. Time to layer. Feet stay warmer with two pairs of socks, something I learned in my Chicago days. Layering is definitely a must and fleece blankets make good wraps. A hat may look silly inside, but who will see if I am simply typing away at my computer? Keeping the heat in saves energy and lowers the heating bills. Wristers, or fingerless gloves are the finishing touch, but I haven't started wearing those yet.

Last night I picked up my knitting with the intention of watching the 10 o'clock news only to find the news delayed by a football game. Clicking around, I found Dr. Who on one of the local PBS stations. I love Dr. Who, Papa and I used to watch the doctor avidly in the eighties, and I was enchanted. The episode began in a creepy way and ended with pure magic. Love it, now I will have to find it again!

It is Sunday, so I am determined to look up and comment on the readings. I find, because they are so truncated, that it is difficult to make much out of the first three readings. I would prefer slightly longer editions and more context. When I first started to post the Sunday readings, I was thinking "what would I preach, faced with these texts?" Two problems. The first is the inconsistency of my blogging over the past six weeks and the second is that to make more out of the readings I need to look them up on Saturday and ponder offline. So, here goes.

The first reading is 2 Kgs. 5:14-17, in which a man is cleansed of his leprosy. The second is 2 Tm 2:8-1.3 If we are alive in Christ we will live, if we die with Chris we will live. So as we live and die so so we will have eternal life--or not. It is our choice.

The responsorial Psalm is Ps 98:1,2-3,3-4, which contains the line "Sing to the Lord a new song for he has done wondrous deeds". What are the wondrous deeds in my life that I can be thankful for today? The birth of a baby who is still marvelous as he is about to be one month old his week; the feat of modern air travel that we take so much for granted that has brought visitors to me this month. I give thanks too for the lovely news from my god-daughter, E, that she is engaged. God is working in her life, in answer to her faith and to her prayers. What can I wonder over, ponder over and marvel at today, this Sunday, this Lord's day as I pause in my week's busyness? Will I sing a new song this week, one of praise and thanksgiving and will it heal the bleak parts of my soul? I think so, if I keep reminding myself to do so.
Gospel
Lk 17:11-19
Ten lepers are cleansed but only one returns to give thanks. Where are our thanks, where is our gratitude

Awaiting the Best Guest

Cold this morning, quite warm this afternoon. In other words, the weather is seasonal for this time of eyar. A marked change from last week when we had a foretaste of winter or the weeks before that when the weather was hot, we are definitely into fall. The late afternoon sun slants into my dining room, the house is delightfully clean thanks to my dear housekeeper I who does the most wonderful job of keeping my house tidy and clean. The garbage waits for pick-up tomorrow and I wait even more eagerly for my sister's arrival.

New grandmother that she is, I expect that she will be tired when she arrives close to eleven tonight and we will be so grateful to our dear friend J for retrieving her from the big airport. At least she is flying straight thorugh without the usual stops and starts, so that is a blessing. Her bed is made up in the newly painted "big room", which can double as a guest room now and I am so excited and happy--will be even more so when she walks through the door.

In the meantime, I haven't gotten much work done but have tried to fix the prices that that price tool on Cafepress has ruined. It is a real shame that this is not working, for the new keepsake boxes are gorgeous. I just ordered three last week and they really are fine and elegant. I liked the old ones, so wasn't really pleased by the change. These are even better, lined with white silk velvet and backed on the bottom with black felt so that the boxes are non-skid and will not mar furniture. Truly exceptional.

Cold weather is on its way

Today feels like winter is on its way! The air is crisp, the sky is bright and the wind is whipping branches around. I love being indoors on a day like this. It should motivate me to clean and do indoor things. Unfortunately, there are so many computer related things to do. The back-up to cds is not complete. Re-installing hardware and software is only begun. My Cafepress shop needs working on and there a million emails that I should send. I think I'll just go take a nap.

Seriously, I think I will go revel in the beauty and serenity of the studio and see what comes together. Serenity would be a gift today.

I am reading Mark Helperin, Winter Tale, a glorious novel from the eighties by a man with a serious gift for both words and rhythm. (One of the characters has a 600,000 word vocabulary.)It is an amazing book and I may just go rejoice in it.

Not much else is doing today so this is a short post.

Fall is coming

Fall is my favorite time of the year. The shortening days mean an end to the languid schedule of summer, the crisp air has a freshness to it that summer smog can never match and cooler weather means that it is time to turn indoors and make soups and stews and bake bread. Thanksgiving and Christmas are nearing and I love these holidays. At the same time this is a difficult season for as the weather cools, my arthritis flares and as the holidays approach my situation of disability and home boundedness is intensified. It becomes more difficult to look outside my boundaries and
be concerned about the needs of others.

In addition, my computer crash makes me even more self-centered. The computer is my lifeline in so many ways. I shop, including for groceries via the internet. I set up appointments with clients and friends through email. I manage a Yahoo group and two small businesses. I even make doctor's appointments over the Internet and ask tech support questions online. I am helpless and hopeless if I am not connected. I blog and read other blogs. Sounds like a computer addict. Being without the computer (until this laptop came home and I began to be more comfortable using it) made me stop and see my environment.

On the other hand, there is the information recovery project of using a different computer and that will go on when the big computer returns in another day or two. I have always meant to record user name and password data off the computer. I did list the old doc file, but that was several months ago and now I find that some of the more recent accounts aren't there. Back-up this information to a notebook. I have a pretty journal, handmade by a friend that will be used for this purpose from now on.

In another day or two, I will find out what I really did back up from the old hard drive. Backing up--no more need be said!

Last night I discovered another great use fore yogurt cheese. Stirred into the reduction of the pan drippings from my chicken strips and green beans, it made a stroganoff like sauce and was delicious. (I have also been using balsamic vinegar in place of soy sauce for quite some time in my "stir frys" so that reduces the salt in my cooking, makes for one less bottle to store and gets the soy out of my diet, since I cannot eat soy.

Random Thoughts

It was hot today and the house is cooling slowly so I don't have much energy or inspiration. Even the sunflowers seem to be feeling the heat as they are flopping over even before they go to seed.

In spite of the heat, I finished knitting a scarf last night, one in a series of three. Each is a different color of Lion Homespun and a slightly different stitch pattern. I plan to write up a pattern for them to make available, either here or on Etsy and put them up for sale. They have been a pleasure to knit. The yarn was a rummage sale find by my dear friend L and I am also knitting some other sparkly yarn that she found for me. The sparkly yarn knits up long and narrow into a variation of what the maker, Crystal Palace Yarns, calls "jewelry scarves". I like the concept.

Much work lies ahead for me to get my Cafepress shop, which I have been neglecting, ready for the coming Holidays. It seems sad in some ways that summer is ending, but Fall is my truly favorite time of the year. I need to return to two writing projects as well, one a memoir, begun just as summer was beginning and the other a long, discursive historical novel that I began too many years ago. Perhaps this will be the year...

The studio is taking shape and I am very happy with it.

Happy Friday!

I can now see my living room again! Hip, Hip, Hooray! More to go, more to go. Parts of the house still look like disorganization reigns, but progress is being made. I am so glad. Decluttering takes more time and energy than accumulating the clutter did in the first place.

Soon I will be working in my new studio! I am determined to organize using containers that I already have on hand. New containers are simply expensive and can become clutter eventually in their own right. Better to reuse and recycle at home with baskets, certain boxes, plastic containers that I have set aside for this purpose.

The sunflowers are heavy and rounded with seeds. They definitely have a life cycle that mirrors ours. The weather is cooler today, so they look less bedraggled. I feel less bedraggled! Each day now the sun is rising a little later and setting a little earlier. My father used to track this progress in the newspaper on the page with the weather information. Now I follow the shortening days on the net, on the weather site. Unlike the newspaper, the computer pages don't have to be hauled outside to be recycled! In some ways though, I miss the newspaper and I miss having someone to share it with.

Only a few more days of August and then it really will be fall. The countdown to Christmas can begin anew. Let's make sure that Advent doesn't get lost in the shuffle this year!

Thursday

The sun has been setting behind the row of sunflowers as I have been at the computer. First the email that has built up while I have been doing other things away from the computer had my attention. Then loading my cafepress feed into Google Base took a few minutes and now I am finally attending to my blog post.

The sunflowers are almost as big as dinner plates and absolutely lovely. Now there are half a dozen where earlier there had only been one at a time. They are rushing to flower and go to seed before the weather turns cold, thus fulfilling their destiny. I have seen this in plants before. A kind of quiet humility that humans do not have.

These majestic plants are almost too big to be humble, but as the seed heads form the plant shrinks. The seed heads bend over and the whole plant reminds me of an old, old woman with osteoporosis. There is humility and waiting in it as time goes by. Waiting for fall, and waiting for the seeds to fall to the ground.

Today I have been looking at my own life, sorting, sorting and throwing out more paper. The boxes are becoming smaller and the stacks will shrink too. My friend L, (she of the sunflowers and apple galette) took away a pile of things to be donated and now my garage sighs with a bit of relief to echo that of the house.

Soon I will go and spend a few minutes in the big room just to admire how pretty it is and then go to bed and finish reading Water for Elephants. It is quite dark in just the short time that it has taken to write this. Fall is definitely coming soon.