Starlight

I don't really know why I keep making Christmas cookies, but each year I make a few standbys and then try a couple new ones too. This year we have butterscotch candies turning into stained glass cookies.

Christmas Eating

After two Christmas parties in less than 24 hours, I'm starting to feel like Mrs. Claus--fat and happy!

These two ornaments were a gift from a young couple who were working with the Peace Corps in the Solomon Islands when we lived there about 100 years ago. Most of the ornaments on our tree are of the homemade variety which makes for bringing back lots of good memories, if not producing a tree that would work for Better Homes and Gardens. The majority of my ornaments are ones crocheted by my grandma. She died a few years ago, and I still miss her.

Thanks

A couple days ago we received this thank you card from friends who had stayed with us. They seem to have picked a card that is right up our alley.

Open it up, and here's the inside:



Inside the card was a nice little check that paid 3/4ths of the bill to get Rachel's car fixed today. I guess we should be thanking them, and we will.

I've Hit a New Low

I went to Taco Bueno twice today.

The lady there asked why we hadn't been there for so long, to which I replied that we were still working on the turkey leftovers.

Almost Advent

Tomorrow begins the season of advent, a time of waiting and anticipation of celebrating the birth of our Saviour. I didn't grow up in a liturgical church, but the traditions I've learned surrounding Advent have become important to me, a way to keep one's perspective during a time of year that can be hectic for many people. The first candle will be lit tomorrow, the candle of hope or prophesy.



The previous two years I was able to send someone else out to buy the Christmas tree, but this year I had to do it myself. We've got it in the stand, but the decoration will have to wait another day or two. Our church Bible study group is having a Christmas dinner at our house on Thursday, so I need to have it decorated by then.

An Old Day

I'm feeling old today.

Maybe it is the hip joint pain. Or maybe it is the lack of energy.


In some ways, I should be feeling young. Today at work we celebrated the work of someone who is retiring at age 75 and who has worked here for 51 years. She plans to spend more time with her kids. And her grandkids. And her greatgrandkids.

If I live to be 75, it is not likely I will have greatgrandkids.

If I live to be 55, it is not likely I will have grandkids.

But I do have kids, even at my age.

Good Kids

We had a mostly pleasant, busy Thanksgiving week that was topped off with a 14 hour visit by Andrew, half of which he (and we) spent sleeping. Andrew was passing through Dallas on his way to Ethiopia for a few days. David was already here visiting for Thanksgiving, so we had a rare occasion for a photo with all three kids.

The time was spent teasing me about my suburb fashion sense, taking care of some financial details, preparing another suitcase of books for the Impact Library (e are now down to just two boxes left in my storeroom) and eating. Oh, and there was also some time for calling people oafs.

. Every Christmas my standard answer to "What do you want for Christmas?" is "Good Kids." I'm fortunate to get what I want.

Thankful for Computers

Now that we've got Gary's new laptop organized and the wireless router working, he's having fun computing all over the house. I also introduced him to wireless radio, so he can have baroque music anytime he wants.

David seems to have found a novel way to use his computer too.

Testing, Testing (web photo album)

I keep thinking I need to redo my website. I kind of gave up on it a while back because I ran out of disk space on my Comcast site. And the way I did the photos was a bunch of work. So I'm now experimenting with a new way of doing photos using the Web Photo album feature of Picasa. If it works in a blog, maybe it would work in a website too.

I suppose if you are reading this and only have dialup, it could be not worth it.

Bugs and creatures

flowers, wild

David

Tick

Within thirty minutes of coming to our house, Sarah was dissecting a tick. What is her mother going to think??
(Be sure to click on the photo to get a closer look.)

Conversation Piece

There has been a lawnmower sitting in our living room for over two weeks. Most visitors are too kind to ask the obvious, so it just sits there in its corner until we feel obliged to explain how this is our third lawnmower and there really is only room for two in the shed.

But today the nice man from church came took one of the two half-broken ones away. We hope he can fix it and then give it to someone who might need it. Now there's room for the newcomer in the shed. But if we move it, what will we have to talk about?

I'm So Young and Beautiful

...that I got carded at Home Depot today for trying to buy this. The computer would not let me buy it until I told it my DOB. *eye roll*

Fruitcake

You know the holidays are just around the corner when the fruitcake arrives from Collin Street Bakery. This is an annual gift from my mom to Gary--I don't touch the stuff myself (except to steal a pecan off the top).

Find The Way

Where is Grace and Purity?

Just down the way from Hope and Purity.

Self Portrait

Two Possible Interpretations

1. These people know a good thing when they see it.
2. These people are stuck in a rut.

A Short Trip to Austin

Gary and I went to Austin on Thursday and stayed in a lovely motel. I-35 splits at that point, not to the east and west, but up and down, into two layers. This feature means you get twice the highway noise per mile than your ordinary freeway. Besides that, the toilet didn't flush, the temperature was either too hot or too cold, and one of the wall circuits didn't work. But it did have high-speed internet access, and after all, isn't that what's important these days for the saavy traveler?

(If you want to see the surprise I got while there, check my other blog.)

Do We Ever Really Know Our Kids?

First I have to read his blog to find out he's having his broken heart checked out.

Then I have to read his myspace to see all the girls flirting with him.

Now I discover on the internet, of all places, that's he's been hiding secrets about neutrinos!

I wonder what else I'm missing??

Unique Names, Please

I have nothing at all against Andrew or Rachel as people, but I am somewhat glad that my two as-yet-unmarried children are no longer dating people with those names. Just too confusing.

At one point, shortly after Laura joined the family, David was dating someone named Lori. I told Rachel she absolutely could NOT date anyone named Larry. Just too confusing.

I do know a man who married someone with the same first name as his mother. That led to two closely related women with the same first and last name. Just too confusing.

That reminds me of a favorite linguistics story in our family. (If you don't understand linguistics, you might not think this is funny.) We were living in Papua New Guinea and we went to market one Saturday morning. There were dozens of different kinds of bananas for sale (have you noticed we only get one or maybe two varieties here in the States?). So we asked someone, "Well, how do you tell all the different kinds of bananas apart?" To which they responded, "It's easy--they all have different names."

Comments

When I first started blogging I thought it was so cool to get comments on my posts. It felt like someone actually was acknowledging me as a person, and a person they cared enough about to converse with. Or, if not that, at least acknowledging I'd said some something worthwhile, or funny, or .... I kind of gave up on that idea by rereading the tag line on my blog and reminding myself that I'm just talking to myself, so if I want comments, I should just leave comments for myself.

I was talking to someone else about comments on blogs. She felt sad that no one commented on her blog. I then asked her, "Well, how often do you comment on the blogs of others?"

Then there are the people, usually my age or older, who think if they leave a comment someone will steal their identity and they'll end up in the poor house due to credit card fraud.

Over the two plus years I've been blogging, I've had a number of comments deleted that I've put on other people's blogs. I can think of about five or six times this has happened. Only once did the person explain to me in an email why they deleted my comments. I suppose if I were to express a touch of cynicism inside of me, I'd say people mostly want flattering or sympathetic comments, your basic feel-good stuff. I guess if I'm going to play the commenting game, I'd better brush up on my interpersonal skills.