Last day of the year.....

.... and we're ending with warm temperatures--- gorgeous outside, like a tropical spring day. (My kind of "winter.") It was warm yesterday also, and I took down the outside Christmas lights and put the lighted reindeer into the garage--- the last bits of holiday decorations around here.

I spent nearly four hours the other day dusting and rearranging my bookshelves. Every book came off of the built-in shelf units surrounding the living room fireplace. I dusted all the shelves, then got to making a little more sense of my books. My set of Dickens volumes went into a glass-fronted curio cabinet in my sitting room. That set is so beautiful that I really should have had them behind glass all along. They just looked so pretty on the living room shelves, but now they're looking just as pretty and they're more protected. The covers are leather, the page edges are gold, and it's my favorite collection of books. I've read my way through half of the volumes so far. Love that set....... I found the volumes on eBay for a tenth of what the set is worth because the seller listed the books without a photo. Luckily, the seller was in Houston, and I got to see the set before paying for it. Gorgeous books.

As for my other books..... on one side of the fireplace, I have all the fiction, decorating books, and travel books. The shelves on the other side holds the non-fiction, biographies, the Christmas books, and the books on the Royal Family. So much easier to find books now when I'm looking for them. And with all the Dickens' books in the sitting room, I have more room on the living room shelves.

Books..... books....... I used to love working in the library when I lived in NY. All those new books coming in..... we got to see everything before the books went out to the public shelves. I think if I had to have a business again, I would want to run a bookshop. One of those quiet little shops like we had seen up in Maine..... selling books and serving tea and cookies. That would be the perfect job for me, if I wanted to have a job. (This is where I look up towards the sky and thank my stars for a blessed life.)

Right now, the Pajama Program is my "job." Since the segment on the PJ Program was re-run on the Oprah show, I've gotten some eMails from volunteers who want to collect pajamas and books for me. Hopefully, these volunteers will follow through and I will have lots of pajamas in January and February to deliver to the children's shelters. After all the PJ collections in December, I was hoping that the donations wouldn't just disappear.

Quiet New Year's Eve tonight........ no party, no company. With everything that we've done since Halloween, I am all partied out for the moment. For the next couple of weeks anyway, and then I will have to get busy planning our Valentine's party. Then the St. Patty's Day lunch in March..... and is Easter in April this year? Always something coming up, it seems...... and I still have everything I need for our Ice Cream Sundae Sunday lunch in my holiday closet. Everything except the ice cream, that is. Details... details.......

This year is the 100th anniversary of the New Year's Eve celebration in NY's Time Square. I'm hoping that Dick Clark will be part of the festivities in NY... it will be a nice way to celebrate the beginning of 2008.

As for 2008........ my wish is that everyone have a most happy, blessedly healthy, bright year filled with serenity, peace of mind, promise and hope.

Alvin, Simon, and Theodore

Those are the names of the three chipmunks from the late 1950s.... and into the 60s, right through the 80s and 90s. We took a break today from de-Christmasing the house (which is all done now) and went to the theatre to see the new "Alvin and The Chipmunks" movie.

The theatre was filled with lots of people our age (born in the 1950s) who remember Alvin and Simon and Theodore. Fun, fun movie..... and now, of course, we can't get Alvin's Christmas song out of our heads. (I just want a huuuuuulaaaaa hoooooop.......)

Very nostalgic, that movie...... brought tears to our eyes at some parts and I can't explain why that is. Most likely because it makes you remember just how many years have gone by since Alvin and the Chipmunks first came out with the television cartoons and the records. I think I had to replace my Chipmunks Christmas record at least twice when I was a kid--- I played it so much that I just plain wore it out. (So Christmaaaaaas don't be laaaaaaaate........)

When we got home, my husband found the original Chipmunks song on the Internet and as it played on his computer, we were dancing in the TV room, both of us with a couple of tears in our eyes.

At the end of the film, as all of us 1950s "kids" sat there and watched the credits roll by (and listened to the Chipmunks music) the makers of this film dedicated the movie to the man who came up with the original Chipmunks concept back in the late 1950s. I wish I could remember his name, but I can't.... but it was very nice of the film's producers to honor him that way.

I don't know what sort of animation they used for the chipmunks, but they sure looked real and furry and adorable.... made me want to look for a chipmunk and see if he could learn to sing.

The day after...

Christmas has come and gone, and if you need proof of that, you can find our 10-foot tree out on the curb ready for tomorrow's trash truck. My husband and I had a quiet Christmas Eve, just the two of us. King crab legs and spinach-balls (just like meatballs, but made with spinach-- delicious), and then we opened our gifts. We both had books in mind, and that's what we gave each other. We'll be busy reading from now till kingdom come, and then some.

On Christmas Day, young Miss C and her mom were here, along with our friends R and C. We all cooked part of the dinner, and as always, we had a grand four-course feast. Between dinner and dessert, we all opened gifts, and as always, C had the most presents--she's easy to buy for at her age, but that may change in a few years.

The weather sort of cooperated... it wasn't as warm as they said it would be on Christmas day, but at least it wasn't freezing and I was able to keep the cats on the porch. So much easier that way..... I wish it could be 80 degrees all year long, for the comfort of both myself and my cats.

We got started on the big tree early this morning... I did the ornaments, my husband did the lights, and we just dragged that tree through the front door and out to the curb. We're not the only ones..... when I walked Gracie this evening, I saw that our around-the-corner neighbor V had her tree out on the curb as well. I'm sure V was out at the local gift shop looking for after-holiday sales at some point this afternoon, but I was just too busy to get there. I'm sure there will be bargains for the rest of the week. That shop is so expensive that the only time to buy there is when they have a sale.

After I got finished with the ornaments on the big tree this morning, I started taking down some of the other holiday decorations. I was just going to do the Santas, then I got started on the angels, then the tiny little elves..... before I knew it, mostly every bit of Christmas was tucked away in that giant closet. Once the nutcrackers got put away, the only thing left was my silver tree, and I did that after dinner tonight. As far as my eye can see, every last bit of Christmas has disappeared. But as always, I will probably find one small thing in the next couple of days that has escaped my eye.

Before we know it, I'll be decorating the house for our Valentine's party. I should not have packed away the big red bows. After all, red is red, and I could have attached my red hearts to the red bows... but I'm not going to unpack what's already packed, that's for sure.

Jingle bells...... today is Boxing Day in England. In this house, Boxing Day means putting all the Christmas decorations back into their boxes. But that's not what it means in England, and right now, for the life of me, I can't remember what the British do on their Boxing Day.

Bookopoly

I don't know how many versions of the "Monopoly" game have been made over the years, but I found one in a Signals catalog that looked interesting. It's called Bookopoly, and it's all based on books and reading. It seemed like a fun game, so I ordered one. Fun and educational, like Scrabble, so I couldn't resist it.

In Bookopoly, instead of buying properties, you buy books (the classics). On the back of each book card, there is a very short summary of the book and a little bio on the author. Instead of houses and hotels, you build bookstores and libraries. There are Knowledge and Explore cards, and instead of going to Jail, you are sent to Watch TV. Great game, especially for book-lovers. I wanted to sit there and read all the backs of those cards, but it would have taken too long while we were playing the game.

Miss C was here this afternoon, hanging out with us for a few hours, so the three of us tried out Bookopoly. It was indeed a lot of fun to play..... I was the first to lose everything--- and I had the two top books -- The Great Gatsby and The Grapes of Wrath (which are located where you would expect to find Boardwalk and Park Place).

We need to get a book-loving group together one night to play this game. I know everyone would enjoy it.... the book-lovers would, without a doubt.

Speaking of book-loving, my friend A was down here from the Pearland area, buying books at Barnes & Noble for her family. She stopped in for a look-see at our tree, and to wish us a Merry Christmas. I had made up a gift-bag for her but just never got the time to see her for lunch these past couple of weeks (too busy with all of those pajamas). A's holiday gift to me was a copy of "Made From Scratch," by Sandra Lee. She said it's a great biography. Another book on my to-be-read pile, which just keeps on growing.

Right now, I'm reading "Last Days of Summer," by Steve Kluger. This is definitely a laugh-out-loud book..... a series of letters written by a 12-year-old boy, and the letters he receives from everyone from baseball players to presidents. What a great book! Just what I needed when I finished reading "The Pillars of The Earth."

Oh well...... I was going to spend the day getting the house ready for Tuesday. The bathrooms got done, and all the dusting, and I decided what to use for the centerpiece on the dining room table.... an assortment of my Santas, along with red candles and silver branches filled with sparkling berries. I still have to do the floors, and get the dining room table set..... but tomorrow is another day, Scarlett.

How on earth can you lose Bookopoly when you own "The Great Gatsby" and "The Grapes of Wrath?!"

Not enough days before Christmas

How can today be the 22nd? Only three more days till Christmas, and it seems that I have a lot of things to do. But on the bright side..... grocery shopping is done, and gifts are wrapped and arranged around the living room. Can't put them under the tree because the branches of our trees always seem to go right to the floor as if the tree were growing up out of the carpeting. Noble fir? Frasier fir? I forget just what type of tree this is that we always get, but the branches always fall gracefully down, like deep ruffles on a Valentino gown.

Today is the the day to start marking things off on my to-do list.... getting everything ready in the house for Christmas dinner. Two of our friends are allergic to cats, which means that after today, the cats will have to stay out on the screen-porch. Thankfully, the weather is warm and the porch will be comfy for them. And I will be vacuuming every carpet and every piece of furniture in the house, making every last cat-hair disappear.

Speaking of comfy, we drove over to Miss C's house yesterday to see the baby bunny in its comfortable bunny-friendly new home. C's dad made the condo-on-stilts from scrap lumber and chicken-wire. The bunny has three little compartments to wander around in, and there's even a bunny litter-box in there. I had no idea they made such a thing. The bunny-litter is just for bunnies, and whatever it's made of, the bunny seemed to know what it was for and he used it right away and continues to use it. See? We could have a bunny! (My husband says no way, and of course he's right.)

C's bunny is friendly and calm, and likes to be held and cuddled. The only time he gets a little skittery is when he's being transferred from one person's hands to another, but then he quickly settles into the new pair of arms and twitches his cute little nose. Every time we see the back-side of the bunny, both C and I say Look at that cute little tail!

In late January, C's bunny will go up for auction at the Agricultural Barn, along with all the other bunnies being cared for by the students in the FFA Program. By that time, C is not going to be able to part with this bunny (Mr. Chubbs, as she calls him). I told C not to worry. If need be, I will be in the audience at the auction, and I will out-bid anyone else there if she truly wants to keep him. My question for the FFA Program is just what do those people do with the bunnies after they win them at an auction?

Pajamas and Bicycles

And the pajamas keep rolling in..... some of them don't even make it to my door. They are collected by downtown groups (hospitals and schools and churches) and then I arrange to have them delivered to one of the downtown children's shelters. I swear, I've had more pajamas and books donated in the month of December than I've had in the last six months. Everyone seems to have the Christmas spirit, which is a very good thing.

The totals, so far....... 2577 pajamas, 2087 books, 155 slippers, and 2 toys. And all of that, except for about 60 very-summery pajamas sets, have been delivered. The summery ones are in my closet, and will be delivered in February, or even in January if I don't get any more flannel or fleece pajamas for the kids.

I hope this pajama frenzy continues when the holidays are over. Oprah will be re-broadcasting her show on The Pajama Program on Dec. 27th. I'm hoping that people who didn't see the first running of the show will see it then and decide host a Pajama Drive for the New Year.

As for the bicycles...... there was an article in the Houston Chronicle today about "Elves and More," the charity that gives bicycles to disadvantaged children. This year's total was 18,000 bikes (my husband and I, along with our neighbor B, put together 20 of those bicycles last week). The trucks are already going out into Houston, distributing the bicycles to the kids. The photo in the paper showed a couple of children standing in the middle of a sea of bikes, looking at the styles and sizes and colors, smiling from ear to ear as they chose the bicycle of their dreams.

The smiles on those kids...... that's why I don't worry about breaking a nail as I attach the pedals or the training wheels to those bikes. Pajamas, slippers, books, bicycles--- wouldn't it be a perfect world if every child could just have one of each. And much more, of course, but at least that's a start.

"Please Come for Mama's Pie & Daddy's Coffee."

That was the invitation to the home of one of our friends tonight...... please join me for pie and coffee-- mama's pie and daddy's coffee. Our friend J lives two streets away from us..... she has a tiny little Yorkie that she walks every morning-- the cutest little dog, and not at all yappy and hyper as Yorkies can sometimes be.

Wonderful lady... she reminds me of the actress Lauren Bacall, and I can just picture J standing next to Humphrey Bogart. However, J would rather be standing next to Johnny Depp, especially if he's in his Jack Sparrow get-up. She thinks Jack Sparrow is "bad to the bone," and she means bad in a very good way.

J also invited another neighbor, B, who lives around the corner from her. The spouses of both J and B have passed away (years ago) and of course, my husband and I have wondered if this is the beginning of a budding romance. A December - December romance, since they are both well into their senior years. J and B come to our Charades parties, and they have enjoyed each other's company during our party nights.

But tonight was just the four of us. J made her mama's chocolate pie, which my husband and I have had before when we went to her home. J uses her daddy's coffee pot to make the coffee-- very strong, as she warns all of her guests. I'm a tea-drinker, so J is always prepared with boiling water and an assortment of teas for me.

After the pie, we played a word game called "Man Bites Dog." Fun game, with a huge deck of cards..... each of the cards has either one or two words printed on it and the object of the game is to make newpaper headlines from the five cards you are dealt. The headlines can be funny or sad, naughty or nice-- but they have to make sense and be a reasonable headline with a subject, a verb, and an object. Of course, if you can throw in an adjective or two, you get more points. We didn't keep score, we just played the game for an hour and had fun with it.

After that, the four of us discussed the state of the world we live in, and compared it to the good old days of the 1930s, the 1940s, and the 1950s. Of course, we solved all of the world's problems, and came up with reasonable explanations as to what's wrong with the 21st century.

Nice night...... simple and nice.... just like the good old days.

Baby white bunnies and purple Christmas trees...

Today was bunny-day for our young Miss C....... she had to pick up a baby bunny that she will be raising as part of a school program for the FFA (Future Farmers of America). C is going to take a part-time job with our local vet, but before she can do that, she has to take the FFA course. She had a choice between raising a chicken, a calf, a pig, or a bunny. Her first choice was a pig, for goodness sake. Thankfully, the subdivision rules don't allow that.

So a bunny it was.... and C's dad built a wooden bunny-house, which they're keeping out on their covered patio. C asked me to drive her to pick up her baby bunny, so that was our adventure for this afternoon. All the way there, C kept talking about how she would pick out the best, the cutest, the softest, the most adorable little bunny. When we got to the agricultural barn, there must have been about 30 bunnies--- and of course, they all looked exactly alike. And, of course, C's bunny is absolutely the cutest, softest, the most adorable.


As for the purple Christmas tree.... I had gone into the Borders Bookstore to get a book that I'd been looking for, and they had a display of table-top Christmas trees. Not green ones, but pink and purple and silver trees. I saw a cute little purple tree that was adorable, and it was only $5.00 because they had 50% off on their holiday items. Five dollars for a purple tree? How could I leave it there?

When Miss C came here after school this afternoon so we could go get her baby bunny, she saw my little purple tree and squealed. She told me that her mom was just talking about having a small purple tree for their kitchen, which is decorated with purple-grape patterns. Had we not been going to pick up the little bunny, C would have wanted to drive to Borders to get her mom one of those purple trees.

After we picked up C's baby bunny, C went home to introduce the bunny to its new home, and I got in my car and went to Borders. Wouldn't you know it....... no more purple trees. But they had the same size tree in a peacock blue and magenta mix. More to my color taste than the purple, and if I had seen this one first, I wouldn't have bought the purple one. I bought the peacock blue/magenta tree and now the purple tree is all wrapped up for C's mom. I called C and told her all of this and she will stop by here tomorrow after school and pick up the little purple tree for her mom. C suggested that I give it to her mom for Christmas, but I've already bought gifts for her mom, and besides (as I told C)--- the little tree will be more special if C surprises her with it.

All those little baby bunnies....... so cute that I wanted one. Just what I need, with a dog and three cats.

Pajamas are like bunnies.....

..... they are multiplying around here. All the volunteers who had told me that they would be hosting Pajama Drives have kept their promise--- all in the same couple of weeks. As a result, I have more pajamas here than my agencies can accept at any one time. Unfortunately, these agencies don't have storage space to hold too many extra books or pajamas, so I usually give them just what they need for a two-week period. (Thankfully, I have deep closets here with lots of shelves. I'm sure that come the end of January, these "extra" pajamas will be going, going, gone.)

I decided to give out all the heaviest pajamas from now till the end of the month..... all the fleece and flannels that will come in handy when we get the cold snaps between now and the end of January. (Although, our latest cold snap has snapped itself out already and we're back to nearly 80 degrees.) The volunteers who are collecting pajamas and books in the downtown area will deliver everything directly to the downtown shelters that I direct them to, which is a real time-saver for me. Being that they're already in the downtown area, it just makes sense for them to do that, if they're willing to, and everyone seems happy to help that way.

I had been counting pajamas and books for most of this afternoon. When the counting and sorting got too tedious (boys/girls/babies/books, boys/girls/babies/books), I went out for a long walk. Gorgeous weather.... too warm for even a light windbreaker. (My kind of winter.)

I went into League City this morning, looking around J's antique shop for some vintage Christmas items. Going to our friends V & S's home the other night inspired me to look for a few more holiday items. V's home will do that to you--- so many Christmas things all over her house that it makes my home look sparse. (My husband would say Never happen! to that one.) I found a vintage 1950s tablecloth..... soft old white cotton with green holly leaves and red candles in the design. Pure retro-Christmas.... it will look great on the little table in our breakfast room. And when I went to pay for that, J told me it was "on him." He said it was a Christmas gift, because he had forgotten to buy us an ornament for our tree this year. So that was a nice surprise and totally unexpected.

I also found one of those small table-top ceramic Christmas trees that everyone was making in the 1970s when ceramics were at their peak. This one looks just like the one that my husband's mom used to have on top of her piano.... except hers was green and this one is white. This one (a steal in J's shop for just $20) has all the little green plastic bulbs and red birds in it, so when you plug it in, the light bulb inside the tree makes all the red and green "ornaments" glow nicely. Very kitsch, very Christmas, and I put it on top of our piano... it reminds me of my husband's mom's favorite holiday decoration.

Tomorrow is a must-go-grocery-shopping day. I've got a list for Christmas week, so I can get most of the items tomorrow, then just leave the very last-minute things for either Saturday or Sunday. Hate to go into Kroger that late in the week, especially before the holiday, but if I get to the store early enough, it shouldn't be too too crowded. (Famous last words.)

A week from today is Christmas. Very hard to believe..... where on earth has this year gone to?

Holiday at V's.....

We went to our around-the-corner neighbor's house tonight...... V invited some of the neighbors over for hot cider and wine and canapes. V is even more Christmas-crazy than we are. She has so many holiday decorations around her house that you feel as if you're in a department store. I swear, you don't know where to look first.

Her best collection are the Black Santas...... she has them all over the mantel, from one end to the other, all over the living room, breakfast room, kitchen, sitting room, dining room..... wherever you look is a Black Santa, and they all have wonderfully kind and jolly faces. If the face isn't "right" then the Santa doesn't go home with V. I found her a large blown-glass Black Santa ornament last year, after Christmas, and I put it away and gave it to V for this year's Christmas present. He had a gentle face....... I knew V would approve, and she just loved him.

The most interesting thing in V's house is a vintage post office mail-sorting unit. It's very vintage, made of wood that's so old that it's smooth to the touch. It stands about seven feet high, approximately six feet wide, and it's filled with cubby-hole squares, where mail used to be sorted by postal workers years ago. V has it in her hallway near the spiral staircase going up to her loft..... and each little cubby-hole is filled with something Christmas. It's amazing, and it takes a while to see everything...... your eye will rest on one item, then gets pulled towards something else. V just loves that cubby-hole thing....... she keeps things in it all year long, but come December, everything comes out of it, and it gets filled up with Christmas treasures.

I think V's home is the only place we go to that makes our own home look like we're not even trying to decorate for the holidays. We have a lot of Christmas things, but V just takes the cake for Christmas. You just don't know where to look first. And V is all set to run up to the local gift shops on the day after Christmas, looking for bargains on things that she will put away for next year. And I'll be right there with her. Jingle bells.

Bicycles R Us

We went downtown today to Reliant Center, where the Elves and More bike-building was in full swing. My husband and I went with our next-door neighbor B and our friend S. The four of us had a two-table assembly line going, and we put together 20 bicycles. All of the bicycles built for Elves and More will be distributed on the 23rd and 24th of December, to disadvantaged children all around the Houston area. (Their goal this year is to build and distribute 17,000 bicycles.)

This is the second year in a row that we've done this for Elves and More. Last year's total for us was 7 bikes, but that was just my husband and I working at it, with not exactly the right tools. This year, we had the right tools (a whole tool box, courtesy of last year's Santa) and we recruited our two friends to build some bikes with us. As we all built bikes (about 200 people), they had Christmas music playing over the loud-speakers in the Center. Our neighbor B said that when we build the bikes next year, we should all dress up as elves. Well, I'm not too sure about that....... I don't think I would look too good in red and green stripes and pointy little shoes.

The weather today has gone nuts..... this morning we had a terrible rainstorm that seemed like a hurricane--- high winds, yellow and gray sky. When the rain quit around noon-time, the sky was bright blue and the sun was out and it was fairly warm outside. When the four of us came out of Reliant Center at 4:00 this afternoon, the wind had kicked up, the temperature had dropped at least 30 degrees and we were all freezing.

By the time we drove home, the wind was even worse and the temperature dropped even lower. What started out as an 80-degree day has turned into a 40-degree night. My husband and I went out for Chinese food for dinner (the bike-building elves were not interested in cooking). When we got home from the restaurant, I bundled up in four layers to take Gracie for a walk. A short walk it was..... just too cold for walking around too many streets, and I was too bundled up to be walking anyway. My husband said I looked like one of the cartoon-character "South Park" kids, with the scarf around my neck and the hood of my jacket pulled tightly over my head. How in the world did I live up north for all of those years, through all of those winters?


I finished reading "The Pillars of The Earth" last night. As hard as some of the chapters were to read, because of the violence of the Middle Ages, I just hated for the story to end. There was one sentence in either the last chapter or the one before that said something like How devastating it would be to find yourself at the end of your life and realize that your time on earth was wasted. That's not an exact quote, but close enough. There's usually a line or two in every great book that just seems to scream out from the page. There were plenty of extraordinary passages in "Pillars," but that one, especially at that point of the story, was worth reading not only twice, but three times. (You would think I'd remember the exact quote, but it was nearly 2:00 in the morning.)

And what did Cher say all those years ago--- Life is not a dress rehearsal... so live! Which is what we did today--- we got out there and built bikes for 20 kids who wouldn't be getting new bicycles for Christmas had we not taken the time today to build them. And last night, I spent three hours counting books (362) and pajama sets (116) donated to the Pajama Program from one of the local elementary schools. They are all sorted and separated and boxed up and ready for me to deliver to kids who wouldn't be getting new pajamas and books if the students at Ed White Elementary hadn't taken the time to collect them.

I don't think I will find myself on my last day on earth thinking that my life had been wasted.

Knee-deep in pajamas...

... which is a very good thing.

I was at a local elementary school this morning, to have a photo taken with the Safety Patrol group who helped the Coach collect and count all the pajamas and books the school collected for our Chapter of the Pajama Program. Over 100 pajamas, over 300 books..... that's an amazing number of items from a school filled with Kindergarten through fifth-grade students.

The Coach is our pet-sitter, who very kindly offered to organize a week-long Pajama Drive there. There were so many boxes of pajamas and books... no way for them to fit in my little car, so the coach will drive them here this afternoon when he's finished at the school.

I had brought one of those giant chocolate-chip cookies for the group of Safety Patrol kids... 20 of them will share the cookie which is decorated like a huge Santa face. By now, I'm sure, every crumb of Santa's face is gone, gone, gone. The kids squealed when they saw the cookie... apparently, not one of them had ever seen a giant Santa-face cookie before. Their squeals were delightful to hear.... and their enthusiasm was heart-warming. They asked me when I would like them to collect pajamas again. I told them that it was up to their Coach, the principal, and their parents. Truly, they enjoyed collecting all the books and pajamas and they're looking forward to the next time they can do it all again.

All those little kids..... so excited to be in school. Makes me want to go up to our own local elementary school and volunteer to be a reading tutor again. But there are just so many hours in a day, and I can't do everything at once. Plus, when I had mentioned wanting to tutor again once before, our own Miss C became very sad........ she was afraid that I would find another little girl to take her place. Even though I told her that there is only one Miss C in our lives, she was very worried. It is not my wish to worry that child. So I think I will just keep my time for the Pajama Program, and let someone else do the tutoring.

Winding down....

It always takes a couple of days to get back to normal after one of our big parties. So much planning goes into one of those, plus all the work to rearrange furniture and set up tables and chairs. We really need a bigger house if we're going to keep hosting these parties.... a bigger kitchen, larger dining room.... and wouldn't it be great to have one big room that would be just for parties. One of the larger homes in this subdivision has just that--- a ballroom, for goodness sake. A large room with a wooden floor.... always set up for company with lots of small tables and chairs. That house was on the market a couple of years ago. I wonder if the people who bought it are hosting parties in that room...... or maybe they just made it a huge home-theatre.

The house as been as quiet as a tomb since the night of the party. After a four-piece band and 36 people have been here, an empty house is sort of like what the living room feels like after Christmas when all the holiday decorations are put away. Young Miss C didn't get to sleep over here the night of the Christmas party after all. Being that she had invited three of her girlfriends to the party, they decided to do a sleep-over at C's house. C asked me if I would mind if she cancelled sleeping over here, and I told her that would be just fine--- by the time our parties are over, all I'm really interested in doing is taking my time and cleaning up everything and putting the rooms back in order before I go to bed.

Pajamas for our chapter of the Pajama Program keep rolling in this month, which is a good thing. One of our friends bought 8 pajama sets to our Christmas party-- so that was a nice surprise. Our other friend has just hosted a Pajama Drive at the school where he works, and I will be picking up those pajamas (over 100) and books (over 300) at the end of this week. Our friend V collected 40 pajama sets and 63 books from the department where she works. By the end of December, we'll have collected and distributed over 2000 pajamas and over 1000 books since mid-April of this year. Not bad, in my opinion, considering that this has all been done on a small-scale personal level.

I'm still walking around the subdivision every night..... lot more holiday decorations are around now, and the streets look very festive. Mostly everyone who has a Christmas tree near a window keeps the window uncovered so the tree can be seen from the outside. It's like walking through a Christmas village every night. On our own street, there are fewer Christmas lights than in years past. Some of the houses on this street haven't bothered to put up any lights at all... or maybe they just haven't had the time to get around to it yet.

Our corner neighbor, the lady who always tossed out a strand of multi-colored tree lights on her front lawn-- she was here at our Christmas party, and she was also at our Halloween party. She has been dog-sitting her son's dog for over six months now, and because she has to walk that dog three or four times a day, she has gotten to know all of her neighbors, and she has become very friendly with all of us. Very interesting lady, to say the least..... she loves Elmo, Meatloaf (the music group), Star Wars..... who would have thought? (She's not exactly a "spring chicken" so those collections of hers are quite surprising.)

And the Christmas lights she tosses out on the lawn--- that started years ago when a neighbor (who has since moved) knocked on everyone's door and insisted that everyone on this street use white lights for their outdoor decorations. The neighbor wasn't taking any excuses, and kept insisting that everyone string up white lights and nothing else. Well.... the lady at the corner didn't want to be taking orders from her next-door neighbor, so she took the strand of multi-colored lights and tossed them out onto her front lawn. However they landed is where they sat for the duration of the month of December. Of course, the other neighbor was livid..... but the corner lady was happy. The tossed-out strand became a tradition with her.... and for the rest of the street as well, come to think of it. Before the corner lady started dog-sitting her son's dog and got to know the neighbors, all of us would wait anxiously to see if she would be tossing those colored lights onto her lawn. And when she did, we all said the same thing: Well, the lights are on the corner lawn, so the Christmas season has officially begun.

Now, since we've all gotten to know her, and like her, some of us are thinking of tossing out our own strands of multi-colored lights onto our lawns...... and wherever they land is where they will stay.

Jingle bells.......... whatever and wherever your holiday decorations happen to be.

What a party......

...... how can we possibly top this one..... No one wanted to leave, which is always a sign of a great party. We had mostly everyone still here at midnight... two hours after the music stopped. The music--- we had a four-man New Orleans Dixieland Jazz band here, and they were positively wonderful. They were dressed up in black suits, with white shirts and red bow-ties. A banjo, clarinet, trumpet and a tall stand-up base.... playing everything that would have brought a smile to the face of Louis Armstrong. What a picture they made, near the fireplace at the front of the living room between the ceiling-high fresh tree and the 1950's silver tree.

Everyone was so surprised with the band..... and half of our friends were dancing in whatever spot they could find-- dining room, living room, the breakfast room. The music they played was mostly from the 1940s through the 1970s, with lots of the big-band hits, plus some jazzed-up Christmas songs.

What a night..... such a great party, we're still shaking our heads at how wonderfully everything turned out. The food from our favorite Greek restaurant was delicious, and I'm glad we decided to order much more than we thought we'd need. Wouldn't you know--- everyone who brought something for the buffet table tonight walked in with either a cake or cookies or candy. I am so glad I just baked two cakes and stopped myself before I started to bake dozens of cookies. We thought we'd have many more Greek spinach and cheese pies left, but there's just about six of those left, and the stuffed grape leaves-- only about a dozen of those in the fridge now. Between the Greek food from the restaurant, and the canapes that I made "just in case," we had plenty of food besides all the dessert selections.

Young Miss C was here with four of her friends, and they helped themselves time and again to all of the desserts (even the rum-soaked cake from S & J, I'm afraid to say), so we don't have as much cake left as I thought we'd have, which is a good thing.

I filled up the punch bowl three times tonight....... it looked so pretty with the cherries floating around in it. The hot apple cider was nearly all gone, even though it must have been 85 degrees tonight while the party was going on. And the coffee urn--- best party investment I've ever made.... it makes from 12 to 42 cups of coffee, so all I have to do is fill it up for one of our parties and then everyone helps themselves.

What a night...... not a Charades night, but all of our Charades group was here, and some of them brought either a friend or a family member so we had a full house and then some.

As I'm typing, it's nearly 2:30 in the morning. The living room and dining room is all back to normal..... and so is the breakfast room, and the TV room, where C and her friends were hanging out and playing card games. When I walk inside now, the house won't even look like we just had a huge party here...... but if I listen closely, I will bet that I can still hear the sound of that band.

Time to go to bed. Tomorrow is another day, Scarlett.

Patience

That's what AngelBoy teaches me...... patience. Anyone with a cat knows that their personalities (purr-sonalities?) are set in stone from day one. Just like people, I guess. They are what they are, and that's just it.

Each of our cats has taught me lessons. ShadowBaby has shown me so many times over the years that there's always time to pet a kitty, no matter how busy we may be. And if you don't bend down to his level and rub his kitty-belly, then he's going to climb up on your lap and higher up to your neck if he has to, just to make the kitty-belly easier for you to reach. Little Mickey Kitty has taught me to smile... no matter what happens, just smile, because what's the alternative? That little cat, with the kitten-sized body, constantly does something to make you smile. He's is truly the happiest of cats.

And AngelBoy... my blue-eyed Birman who is too beautiful for words, too prissy for his own good, and just too everything.... he has taught me patience. Which is going some, because I think I always have had a good degree of patience. But this cat.... he has taken my tolerance level to the highest degree.

I had intended to keep the cats and our dog in our bedroom/bathroom suite for tonight's party, so we could use the screen-porch for extra table set-ups and chairs. Yesterday, I gave it a trial-run, keeping all three cats in the bedroom for the afternoon. I was busy getting the living room and breakfast room set up with tables and chairs, so I wasn't paying too much attention to the cats. Which doesn't wrinkle the whiskers of ShadowBaby and Mickey Kitty-- they just slept most of the afternoon. Not so with AngelBoy..... when I went back and forth into the bedroom yesterday afternoon, there he was-- meowing for me, practically begging me to pet him or pay attention to him, and giving me his best little how-can-you-resist-these-blue-eyes-of-mine kitty face.

But I did resist, and just kept telling him I was busy with tablecloths and centerpieces. And in and out I went, without so much as a little tiny pet underneath his chin. Well, how dare I?

When I was all done with the tables, back I went into the bedroom to settle up with AngelBoy. Too late. Too blessed late. My blue-eyed kitty-demon picked a corner of the carpeting (near my side of the bed, of course) and left me a tinkling little gift.

When he saw that I noticed what I did, he sat up straight with his fluffy tail curled around his front paws and gave me the blue-eyed stare that I know so well. It's his look that says Well, if you would pay attention to me when I need you to pay attention to me, that would never have happened.

I cleaned up the carpet. Scrubbed it and disinfected it and sprayed it, all the while under the careful blue-eyed supervision of AngelBoy. Was he thinking that I missed a spot?

When I was done, I put all three cats back into the screen-porch, and that's where they are now, and where they will stay for the party. Just as well, I guess..... the temperature is over 80 degrees and no one is going to want to sit out there in the humidity we will have tonight. We will make do with all the tables and chairs that are in the house and not even think about the screen-porch, which is what we usually do for our parties anyway. Gracie and the cats will be on the screen-porch and they will watch everyone inside the house as if we're on display. And, as always, AngelBoy will be the one who gets closest to the windows of the breakfast room so he can stare at our friends until one or two of them say Well isn't he just the most precious darling cat?

Give unto me a blessed break.

I've got just about everything ready for tonight...... I baked cakes yesterday, and I just finished frosting them a little while ago. As soon as the dishwasher cycle has ended, I will empty that out and then get myself ready and dressed for tonight. The tiny last-minute things can be done after that. I plan to be all done by 3:30, and then I will sit down and polish my nails. That will be the very last thing to do.... and while they dry, I can read a chapter or two of "The Pillars of The Earth." I will be sad when this story comes to an end. The characters have become as real as my neighbors.

I expect early arrivals at 5:00 or so....... it always happens that someone comes early. We never know who to expect before party-time. Used to be that Frankie always came early, so she could sit and chat with us before everyone got here. I expect that Gary will remind me of that around 5:15 or so...... he always thinks of Frankie on party nights.

Party Day Minus One....

Today is baking day..... two cakes-- one chocolate, one angel food. I was going to bake some cookies as well, but I don't think I will need them for the party. One of our friends just dropped off a cake that he baked this morning..... he's coming tomorrow night but will get here a little late because he has a dinner to attend first. Our friend J is baking Italian pastries for us, and I know that a couple of other friends are bringing sweet things, so I think I will just bake cookies for Christmas Eve and Christmas dinner.

The weather has warmed up nicely, and the cats slept on the screen-porch last night, instead of in the laundry room. Which means that I had a good night's sleep-- rather than being woken up at 4:30 in the morning because ShadowBaby needs to make sure that I know he's sleeping on my pillow. I'm planning to keep Gracie and the cats in our bedroom/bathroom suite for the party tomorrow night..... this way, we can use the screen-porch as well as the rest of the house for the party. 36 people so far, and I know there could be more because some friends will bring other friends or family members. I will have to put something in front of our bedroom door tomorrow night so no one goes in there. Wouldn't they be surprised, to walk in there and be faced with Gracie and three little cats. I have my "free" books in a big basket by the tree... I think I will put that on a small table in front of our closed bedroom door, to keep everyone out of that side of the house. The basket has a little sign on it that says "Free to a good home."--- That's where I put all the books that our friends get to choose and take home with them.

My cousin L sent me a package the other day..... when I unwrapped it, I found a Santa dressed all in silver. Such a nice face on him, and a soft full beard.... very nice, and perfect for our silver Christmas tree. I didn't know she was sending him, and she had no idea that I have a growing collection of Santas, so it was a nice surprise. I will have to take a picture of her silver Santa standing in front of our silver tree, so I can show her what a great match it is.

Our friend and around-the-corner neighbor V stopped by last night..... she brought me 40 pajama sets and 63 books, from her office party----- she had asked everyone to bring in either pajamas or books for my Houston Chapter of Pajama Program. I knew she had asked everyone to do that, but neither of us had any idea how successful her request would be. They had tried to collect things for other charitable organizations in the past, with limited success. When V came by last night with the back of her car filled with boxes of pajamas and books, I was just very overwhelmed. I've already counted and sorted everything, and separated them into boxes that I can deliver to the children's agencies next week.

Our friend and pet-sitter is having a Pajama Drive at the school where he teaches....... the PJ Drive started this past Monday, and ends today. At last count on Wednesday, they had 70 pajama sets and over 200 books, so heaven only knows how many pajamas and books he will be bringing to me next week. He also asked me if I would visit the school next week to meet the kids and have a photo taken with the principal. I told him I would absolutely do that. These pajama collections are coming at a good time of the year, and I'm thankful for friends that have been so willing to get involved with this.

I need to quit typing and get into the kitchen. The house is all party-ready, except for the screen-porch which I will do tomorrow morning after I put the cats into our bedroom suite. It seems that I've been moving my poor cats from one side of the house to the other all week long, and keeping them away from the living room, dining room and breakfast room. If I could wave a magic wand, I'd give myself one more room in this house (for a Pajama Program office), and a little "cabin" out in the backyard so Gracie and the cats could stay out there when we have so much company in here.

But I really need to quit typing and get to baking.

Stupid Weather....

I shouldn't complain about the weather. The temperatures here are bouncing between close to 80 degrees during the day and 55 degrees at night. Not that 55 is so freezing, but when your body is used to 85 and above, those lower temperatures just get to you. I wish the weather would just stay warm..... 85 during the day would be great, and 75 all night long would be purr-fect for the cats so I can keep them on the screen-porch at night.

And the cats.... I keep moving my cats from the laundry room to the screen-porch, keeping them out of the house because I've started setting up for this weekend's Christmas party. Little Mickey Kitty doesn't like to be cold, and 55 degrees to him is freezing. (He takes after me.) Until after the party, the living room, dining room, breakfast room and kitchen are off-limits to the cats. They're staying in the screen-porch during these warm days, and sleeping in the laundry room at night. AngelBoy has his prissy little whiskers in a snit because he can't go underneath the big Christmas tree in the living room now and drink the water out of the pan. For a prissy cat who won't drink water out of a pet bowl unless it's just been freshened up, he sure doesn't mind drinking that sappy tree water.

I may keep the cats and the dog in our bedroom on Saturday night so we can use the screen-porch during the party. It's going to be very warm over the weekend, with 80s during the day, and 65 at night. With that kind of Spring-like temperature, it would be nice to be able to use the screen-porch. Can't do that with the pets out there, but if I put them all in our bedroom/bathroom suite, they should be just fine. With those warm temperatures, I won't need to be piling jackets and coats on top of our bed as our friends come in, plus I can always use the sitting room for jackets/purses if I need to.

We've got 35 people coming to the party, and we could have 40 if some of our friends bring their visiting family members. One more reason to use the screen-porch--- with that many people, the wicker furniture on the porch will come in handy. Which means that I will have to keep the cats in the bedroom starting on Saturday morning so I can get the porch ready. No matter how many days in advance I start getting ready for these parties, there always seems to be a lot of last-minute stuff to do.

I've already had my pre-party meltdown this week..... "Whose idea was this to invite so many people?".... So now I can concentrate on getting ready for Saturday night. We're ordering the food today, from our favorite local Greek restaurant, and tomorrow I'm going to bake two cakes, and I may just make some of those sugar cookies with the cookie-gun thing that was hiding in the pantry. I found a new punch recipe which will have dozens of sweet cherries floating in the punchbowl--- it will look very Christmas-y.

Young Miss C asked us if she could sleep over here after the party and we told her yes. Without a doubt, she will be standing by our front door that night and telling her mom "Thanks for coming!" as her mom goes home after the party is over. We told C she could invite four of her friends to the party, and she decided to invite four of her girlfriends and leave out the boys this time. When the night is over, she will help me clean up while we talk about the party-- she likes that part almost as much as the party itself.

This will be the last party of the year. We're having friends over for Christmas dinner, but eight people around our dining rooom table seems like a walk in the park when you compare that with 40 people coming for a holiday get-together. We haven't talked about New Year's Eve yet, but being that we're having such a big Christmas party, I don't want to have a big to-do for New Year's.

I'm still walking every night.... up and down and around all the streets on this side of our subdivision. I've seen everyone's Christmas lights, and I bring my cell phone with me and talk, talk, talk while I'm walking. Sure makes the walk go by quicker. Next week, I'll have a look-see at the holiday decorations on the other side of the subdivision.

The holidays bring out the emotional ups and downs, and I've already had a couple of tear-filled moments. I get emotional around the holidays anyway, and if something sad or unexpected or nostalgic gets tossed into the mix, then the tissues go flying.

"Someday"

The following is from a children's book. It's such a wonderfully pretty little book, with delightful pictures of a mother and a baby. As the story progresses, the baby grows into a toddler, a teen.... and then grows up... and the pictures stay delicate and pastel-y and heartwarming throughout the book. Each page has just the one sentence, which clearly describes the pictures above the words.

The title is "Someday," by Alison McGhee and Peter H. Reynolds:

One day I counted your fingers and kissed each one.

One day the first snowflakes fell, and I held you up and watched them melt on your baby skin.

One day we crossed the street and you held my hand tight.

Then, you were my baby.... and now you are my child.

Sometimes, when you sleep, I watch you dream, and I dream too...

That someday you will dive into the cool, clear water of a lake.

Someday you will walk into a deep wood.

Someday your eyes will be filled with a joy so deep that they shine.

Someday you will run so fast and so far your heart will feel like fire.

Someday you will swing high-- so high, higher than you ever dared to swing.

Someday you will hear something so sad that you will fold up with sorrow.

Someday you will call a song to the wind, and the wind will carry your song away.

Someday I will stand on this porch and watch your arms waving to me until I no longer see you.

Someday you will look at this house and wonder how something that feels so big can look so small.

Someday you will feel a small weight against your strong back.

Someday I will watch you brushing your child's hair.

Someday, a long time from now, your own hair will glow silver in the sun.

And when that day comes, you will remember me.

Lost in The Middle Ages.....

Inbetween everything else going on this week, I'm still reading "The Pillars of The Earth." I suppose I will be reading this book for most of the month.... nearly 1000 pages long, it's not a quick read, and there's too many interesting historical details in this book to be skimming through it. I'm not a skimmer, anyway. If a book is good enough to read, then I want to read every word of it. And if it's not, then I don't even want to waste time skimming through it.

When The Middle Ages get too intense, then I take a break and page through one of my Christmas books. So many recipes in all of these beautiful books, and every year I promise myself that I will make Christmas cookies but somehow they never get baked. Looking at all the pictures of the beautiful cookies somehow seems to satisfy the urge. At least the pictures aren't filled with calories, as the cookies would be.

We do have a cookie gun in this house. I had bought it for my husband a couple of years ago, when he got the urge to make those imprint-cookies. Trouble was, I gave it to him for Christmas, and we didn't want to be baking cookies after the holiday because we had enough goodies in the house as it was. I took the cookie gun out of the pantry yesterday and read the directions...... seems simple enough, and I have everything I need for the sugar cookie recipe. If I make them for the party, I don't want to be baking them too many days before the party, so that means I will have to be baking on Thursday or Friday. That might be do-able, as long as everything else gets done before that. The to-do list for these parties seems to be a mile long. And didn't I just go through that same to-do list for the Halloween party?

They didn't have cookies in the Middle Ages. They did have all kinds of bread--- horsebread being one of the most popular. I don't even want to be asking about the recipe for that one.

I haven't cooked much since we went out to the Moroccan restaurant on Friday night. We still have left-overs in the fridge from that night, which we've been eating. And on Saturday, we ate in Galveston, at the "Dickens on The Strand" festival. I have a feeling that no matter what I cook from now on, I will be thinking that it isn't as good as the Moroccan food.

Our temperatures here have gone from 80 degrees to 45, and the weatherman said it will be close to freezing tonight, then it will keep getting back to the warmer temperatures as the week goes along. But the cats will be sleeping in the house tonight, instead of on the screen-porch. Which means that one of them, most likely ShadowBaby, will be waking me up before dawn. Translation: I will be reading "Pillars" before the sun comes up, because once the cats wake me up, I very rarely can fall back to sleep again.

And that right there, trying to fall back to sleep after a cat walks across your pillow and puts his paws around your head, should be the biggest problem that anyone should have to face.

So many things going on this week, this month, this year. It's a wonder that I can sleep at all.

Christmas in Galveston

This weekend is the annual "Dickens on The Strand" Christmas celebration on Galveston Island. Today was a beautiful day... warm and mostly sunny, so off we went. The Island encourages everyone who goes to Dickens to dress up in Victorian costumes. Into my closet I went, and out came a long black skirt, a velvet cape with vintage-looking fringe, and a vintage black-corded purse.

My husband was going to dress up in his pirate costume from our Halloween party, but then he decided not to. He wasn't sure that pirates would have been around in the Victorian era. And wouldn't you know-- there were more than two dozen men there dressed up as pirates. I told him next time, that pirate costume will have to go to Galveston for Dickens.

There were lots of the usual food booths.... Scotch eggs, fried shrimp-on-a-stick, funnel cakes, reuben sandwiches, Mediterranean food, blooming onions, and every kind of fried potato-shape that you can think off. There are lots of restaurants along The Strand in Galveston, but if you're going there for a street festival, it doesn't make sense to be sitting inside a restaurant when all the fun is going on outside.

The problem is that all of those food vendors aren't selling very healthy choices. I had one of those fluffy funnel cakes, and I asked them to put just a teeny-tiny touch of sugar on it, and then I just ate half of it, with a cup of hot cider. (Hot cider. It was 85 degrees out there, but somehow the cider just seemed to be the right thing.) As I was making up my mind about what to eat, I figured that no matter what I ate, nothing would compare to last night's dinner at the downtown Moroccan restaurant.

We tried walking through a couple of the antique shops, but so did a lot of other people, so it wasn't exactly a pleasant shopping experience. And with a lot of the ladies dressed up in those huge hoop-skirted Victorian costumes, trying to make your way from one end of the shop to the other was like going through an obstacle course. (How did Victorian ladies get any shopping done without wrecking half of the store as they walked up and down the aisles?)

The Queen's Parade this afternoon was beautiful.... lots of bagpipe bands and school groups dressed in vintage costumes, and of course, Queen Victoria--- really a local woman who happens to look like a young Victoria, and she's got the "Queen's wave" down perfectly. In one of the other carriages was an actual descendant of Charles Dickens-- the parade wouldn't be the same without a Dickens family member in it. There was also a just-married couple who must have taken their vows at one of the Galveston churches, because they were being driven in a white horse-drawn carriage.

The first weekend in December is always reserved for the Dickens celebration in Galveston. It starts the holiday season for southeast Texas. Next comes our own Open House Christmas party, this coming weekend. Jeez...... it's going to be a busy week for me. Jingle bells.

"Because I'm the mom, that's why."

I was flipping through television channels yesterday looking for something to listen to while I sat there and let my fingernail polish dry. On Channel 12, Dr. Phil had a woman named Anita Renfroe. I don't watch that show, but I heard Dr. Phil's wife introducing this woman who was going to sing her litany of "everything that a mother says every day of her life."

Sounded interesting, so I didn't change the channel. What followed was Anita Renfroe singing her mom-things to the tune of "The William Tell Overture." Funny, funny, funny..... there is just no other word for that performance. You have to listen carefully, and you will find yourself holding your breath and trying not to laugh out loud because you don't want to miss a word of what she's singing.

I told my husband about the "mom song" when he got home, and he found it on the Internet and down-loaded it. It was even funnier the second time around, and I'm sure anyone who's really a mom could listen to it over and over again. Funny stuff, and very touching... we had tears in our eyes when it was over.