The little things....

I've been neglecting this blog-page lately. No reason... none that I care to print, anyway. No excuses... none that would make any sense to anyone but myself.

I have been on the phone more these past few months than ever before, unless you count my teenaged years, when a telephone seemed permanently attached to one side of my head at any given time. So, just maybe, the phone calls have "released" everything that I used to type out onto this page.

I spoke to my friend F today....... she has been missing my daily typing in here. Even though this is all mundane, everyday stuff... just little things.... the fact that it's being missed is enough to get me back to typing.

So here we go..... back to the little things that take up so much time during all of our days. Maybe that's the secret to a long and happy life--- don't worry too much about all the big things, just concentrate on the little things that make you smile.

Our Thanksgiving holiday was fabulous..... lots of good company, way too much food, but isn't that what Thanksgiving is all about? Friends, family, food. As always, I had my pre-dinner-party meltdown when I complained about not having enough room in the fridge, and wishing I had three ovens instead of two. The day after Thanksgiving, my husband went out with young Miss C and picked out a ten-foot tree for our living room. We spent the weekend decorating that, with help from C. I don't think she realized just how long it takes to string up vintage Christmas lights and attach blown-glass ornaments to all of those branches. I think we just plain wore her out for those two days.

The tree is up, the rest of the house is all decorated (and had been even before the turkey went into the oven)..... and now we're counting down the days till our Christmas Open House party next weekend. We still have to order the food (spinach pies and cheese pies from our favorite Greek restaurant)...... and I still have to decide whether I want to make at least 100 of the little meatballs I made for our last party-- or just order more Greek food...... and then we have to think about dessert--- do I want to start baking, or should I just order some things from a very delicious bakery that opened up near us--- everything is baked from scratch, by the two women who run the shop. And, of course, even though we told our friends they didn't have to bring anything to this party, I know that some of them will be walking through the door with trays of food and goodies. Once again--- lots of good company, lots of good food.

This weekend is "Dickens on The Strand" in Galveston...... depending on the weather, we may or may not drive out there for that. We're having a run of warm and sunny days now, in stark contrast to the 55-degree rainy weather that we had on the weekend after Thanksgiving. Now we're back up near 80, where we belong. I don't think I could ever get used to really cold winters ever again.

I've been reading and reading and reading and reading lately, which has also taken away from my typing time. Right now, I'm reading the new Oprah book-- "The Pillars of The Earth," by Ken Follett. Amazing story..... I was skeptical at first, but I quickly got absorbed in the Middle Ages. When I need a break from the monks and the knights and the men-at-arms, I page through one of my Christmas books. I'm inspired with all the Christmas cookie recipes, but I haven't tried any of them yet. I know for a fact that if I start baking cookies, I will also start eating cookies. And heaven knows that every cookie crumb will end up on my hips.

Speaking of hips..... I was in Marshall's yesterday and bought a fabulous black satin skirt for our Christmas party........ then I went to SteinMart this morning and found the perfect top for it--- actually, I found two: one in black and one in bright red. I couldn't make up my mind, so I bought them both. I will probably wear one for our party, and one for Christmas day. Everyone is coming here for Christmas dinner.... the same group, minus K and B, who will be in Egypt for most of the month of December. Another one of their adventure tours, taken during December because of the marked-down tour prices.

Back to that black skirt..... every time I find a pretty skirt, it always seems to be black. Somehow, black always seems to work, and depending on the fabric, it can be totally casual or supremely elegant. This black satin is wonderfully soft, and the top that I found to match it looks as if it had been made for the skirt. My Aunt Dolly always says that you can never go wrong with a great black skirt and a pretty top. Which always worked for her (and still does) and now seems to have worked for me as well over the years. I always have a lot of black skirts in my closet, but I usually find "just one more" whenever I go shopping. Speaking of shopping, yesterday was my first shopping for me day since the end of August. I've been trying to really wear (really wear) everything that's in my closet..... and if I take something out that I don't like anymore, I've been putting it right into a shopping bag that will be donated to one of the local shelters. One of the things I recently put into the donation bag was a powder-blue suede skirt with fringe along the hem. I'm sure I bought that with the intention of making a cowgirl costume with it for one of our Halloween parties. At least, I hope that's why I bought it--- I would hate to think that I had bought it to wear out on the street.

Amazing how many little things I can type out here, with a minimum of thought. Just open up the laptop, wait for the screen to wake up, then type, type, type. And for all these minutes of typing about mundane little things, my mind hasn't been thinking about all the big important things that have been going on for the past couple of months. Which, in itself, is a blessing.

So here we go. This one is for you, F...... so you have something to read when you don't want to think about anything else.