Still breathing...

So...  about a month and a half ago, when I wrote my last post, I was full swing into packing for a move, and now well into December we're snug in our new place, but with still too many unpacked boxes to deal with.

It's been quite a ride - getting our new place ready to move into, all the while finishing packing, taking the move in stages, putting our home of 23 years on the market, and two days ago we closed on the sale of our old place.  

It has been an exhausting whirlwind, and I can't tell you how glad I am that we are only responsible for one house again.   We've been sleeping in the new place for nearly four weeks now, though how that much time has passed already I haven't a clue.  I suppose things like an unplanned doctor visit, some tests a couple of weeks ago (that didn't show any problems, but also didn't explain some annoying things), a son having surgery in November and our helping him out for a few days, and Thanksgiving that, in the end, didn't happen (due to a couple different COVID exposures among the invited), combined with taking care of issues at two houses... I'm sure it's all messed with my sense of time...

And somehow I've gotten a sore knee in the process of moving and I feel like I've aged 10 years, but other than that, it's all gone swimmingly.  😅

I'm looking forward to life eventually resuming some normalcy, eventually getting back to some crafting, and catching up with my blogging buddies.  I know I've missed a lot in the last month or so, but I hope to catch up a bit with what's been going on with my favorite bloggers - even though I probably won't be fully back in the swing of blogging for several more weeks, I'm guessing.

I hope you're enjoying this season and all that it brings.  This Advent, I'm feeling a real sense of joy seeing the signs of Christmas, hearing carols, and ultimately being reminded of Jesus' birth, and the great gift of salvation God offers to all through his Son.  I'm looking forward to our first Christmas in our new home, and even seeing the first winter snow fall on our new yard, though I wouldn't mind if that holds off until January, and I hope it falls when I don't have to go anywhere.  😉

I have nothing of note really to write about in any detail.  And while I've been exceedingly busy and productive, the house is still too disheveled for me to want to share pictures, and I don't know when or if I'll be decorating for Christmas, or even getting back to my crafting.  Unpacking my crafting stuff is pretty low priority at the moment.

I've really only come in here to let my blogging friends know that I am doing well and I haven't abandoned blogging, I'm just taking a hiatus.  I will start popping into blogs here and there, and expect to be back in the swing of blogging again myself before the year is completely over. 

I hope you have a very Merry Christmas!    

Making Space...

Checking in with a progress post on our move.  Tomorrow is closing day and it's hard to believe we're at this point already.  Packing continues, and life doesn't slow down for it.

There is so much I could write about things going on alongside all the packing, but one of the biggest highlights was that we had the opportunity to meet the sellers of the house we're buying.   They had a garage sale last weekend and while I stayed home on Friday to wait for a furnace tune-up, Hub went over to the sale and met the couple we're buying the house from.

As they talked, Hub & the sellers found they had some things in common.  Mr. seller graduated from Purdue, which Hub also did, and I attended.  Not necessarily unique around these parts, but it's always fun to meet another Purdue Alum.

Then they asked if Hub knew T...  B(ourlastname), and Hub was thrilled to tell them that was his brother.  Now... to our knowledge, Hub's family are the only people in the state with our last name. We live about an hour south of where Hub's brother & sister lives, so it's not very often that we run into each other's people.   You might be able to imagine when it does happen, people instantly are curious if we're related since our name is pretty unique in these parts.    

Anyway, turns out when this couple lived further north, they attended church where my husband's mother, father, sister and brother & his family all attend(ed).  What a small world!  

Then Saturday, I went over to meet them (and Hub went again, too).  We ended up buying some office furniture which will be great because we have an old computer table that is looking seriously shabby, and it probably wouldn't move well if we tried.  

I addition to that, when I saw in the garage sale a picture I had admired when looking at their house, I started to offer to buy it, and before I could get the words out completely, the Mrs. gave it to me.   And through our realtors they had previously offered us three nice bar stools they have at their kitchen island, so it looks like we're set in there, too.  It was so good to meet this terrific couple (and some of their family, even).  They seemed genuinely glad to meet us, too.  It's nice to know we're not meeting complete strangers tomorrow at the closing.

Immediately after the closing, we take possession of the new place.  We plan to take a couple of loads over tomorrow late afternoon.  I'm lobbying for getting Chinese take-out and having our first meal there at the kitchen island as a celebration.  

Meanwhile, packing continues...

I don't know how it is, but with each box packed and put in the garage, it seems I become aware of how much more there is to pack!  It feels a tad overwhelming, but then I remind myself that we get to make this move in stages.  The plan is to move small stuff ourselves during the week after closing.  We have a smallish moving van rented for next weekend and will move medium-sized stuff when we have more help.  Then finally we've scheduled (hopefully big, burly) movers to handle the truly heavy stuff - like furniture, an upright freezer, a piano, and anything else we're too pooped to deal with...  

We've never done a local move before and this concept of moving in stages is interesting to plan out, and I hope will be a lot less exhausting in the implementation.

This past Thursday a friend helped me pack up most everything in my china cabinet.  Before we started I told my friend I wanted to take some pictures of the process.  I thought I'd be artsy and get fun angles of her hands placing nicely wrapped dishes in boxes, reaching for dishes in the cabinet, things like that...  Half the time the dining room table was covered with dishes and packing material and even that would have been a great shot.  But do you think I could actually remember to do this?!?   Of course not!  I seem incapable of being part of the process and documenting it at the same time.  So instead of artsy pictures that could provide me great memories in my old age, I have pictures of stacks of boxes containing dishes and china cabinet stuff as they fill my living room, that will only serve to remind me of my aching back in my dotage.

Books have been the easiest thing to get packed, but I will tell you - packing is seriously making me rethink being a collector of books.   In order to not create too heavy of boxes, when I can't put my hands on a small box, I've found that packing books and yarn (or any soft, lightweight items) together is a great way to make sure I'm not packing boxes that are too heavy to actually carry.  

Who knew my closet full of yarn would come in handy in this way?  My books and yarn will possibly end up in the same room at the new house, so the items are a natural to pack together. 😄 

I know a few books slipped out during this challenge before I took a picture of them, but looking back through these posts and counting books pictured, I can see (including today's post) I've gotten rid of at least 194 books in the last year.  Today, I've just counted 50 that came out of the family room!

And lastly for today, I've finally decided I'm just getting rid of the rest of my Taste of Home magazines and am not going to look through any more of them to determine if there are recipes I'd like to save.   I think I counted 29 below:

So this week I have 79 more things leaving the house and I've more than met my goal of 1,000 things gone in a year's time.  If I could take this packing business slower, I could probably get rid of 1,000 more things in the next few weeks, but I can see that isn't going to happen. My decluttering journey (while I probably won't document it further here - at least, not in the same way) will, no doubt, continue at the new place.

I'll try to remember to keep a camera close and snap some pictures this next week.  Once we have possession, I'll feel freer to post some pictures of the new place (or at least spaces in the new place).  A whole empty house isn't going to be terribly interesting, but I'll see what I can do.  

Making Space Week 51:   1029  things gone!

We've found it!

I have been looking forward to the day I could share my good news, and I think it's finally safe to share it!   I haven't been writing much about our house hunting, but up until recently it's been going on in the background consistently since I first mentioned we were starting to look - back in June.

After visiting houses nearly every weekend from June through September, we found our new home on September 24th!  While we weren't sure about it just reading the listing description and seeing the pictures online, neither of us had any reservations at all once we saw it in person.  This had been my prayer from the beginning - that the house we would choose would feel right to both of us when we saw it.  If you knew Hub's and my personalities (not always in sync), how often we vacillated over what this next house should be (nearly weekly), how few houses that "checked our boxes" were showing up on the market (few to none), you would know that was no small prayer.

Whether or not you're considering buying a house right now, I'm sure you know that in today's market, good houses go fast!  The house we're buying was listed on a Friday afternoon, we made a 6:00 pm appointment to see it, and at 9:00 pm we were leaving the realtor's office after signing our offer to buy.  It sounds crazy, but that's what buying a house is like in 2021.  Whoever "they" are, "they" aren't kidding when they say buying a house in this market is not for the faint of heart.  

This house not only checked all the boxes of what we felt were important, but it also had everything on my personal wishlist, and then some.  I am so undeservedly blessed by that.  In four months, while we had seen some very suitable houses, this was the only house we both felt equally compelled to make an offer on.  And (no surprise) we weren't the only ones who felt that way.   

Knowing by Friday night there were already multiple offers, and knowing the chances were very low that the first time we'd make an offer on a house it would be accepted, we waited just over 40 hours assuring ourselves that we would be just fine if we got it or not.  By Sunday the 26th, we were becoming pretty sure that we were not the winning bidders and were truly okay with it - and then a call came when we were out to lunch with friends.  We were asked to provide bank records to prove we could back up our offer, and a few hours later the second call came telling us our offer was accepted - out of seven total offers made!  We were told the offers were competitive, and later heard (through the grapevine) that ours wasn't even the highest, at which point our delight expanded to wonderment. 

While the house and property please us, it is not really what we envisioned when we set out on this search.  Though, to be honest, our vision kept changing as we looked at various houses - none of them being quite right.   At some point in the process I began to realize that this house hunting was as much about us adjusting our expectations and hopes, and even being willing to walk away from many nice houses that just didn't feel right for us, as it was about finding the right house.  Walking away from several houses was sometimes a step of faith, but we always had peace about it, or quickly gained peace once the decision to walk away was made.  What a process this was!

So... we've begun packing and expect to close at the end of this month and begin moving the first week in November.  Hopefully, we'll not experience winter weather before we get moved in, but regardless, we look forward to celebrating Thanksgiving in our new place.  And this morning at church I signed us up to host a small dinner gathering in early December.  I'm already looking forward to it.

I hope to take some pictures of the process of moving, but I know that may be a challenge for me.  I'm either good at throwing myself into a process, or being a photographer, but rarely do I manage to do both very well at the same time.  We will see...

Meanwhile, as we try to eat our freezer inventory down, we sort and pack, sort and pack.  I am so thankful I've gotten rid of so much this past year (easily it will be over 1,000 things), but still I'm discovering things I didn't know we had.   Living in the same house for 23 years makes that happen, I suppose.

This past week I started packing books, so culling out those least likely to get read has been my goal. This is just one book case's worth, so hopefully, it's just a start:

And a couple of weeks ago, I had culled through my closet, so I have this little stack of clothing to go:

And, as always, there will be collections of random things we realize we don't need, and certainly don't want to move - like this:

The only noteable thing above is the cat drawing my artist sister made of our first kitty, Sy Snootles.  Sy has been gone for over 30 years, and we no longer display the picture so I asked artist sister if she'd like the picture back - perhaps to pass along to one of her grandchildren.  She seemed thrilled with the idea.  It's on its way to her as I type.  😊

With just three more weeks to my 1000 things gone goal:

Making Space Week 49:   950  things gone!

 

Making Space...

Things are pretty bustling here and I'm not finding time to blog much, but I do want to let my blogging buddies know I'm still around.  I check into your blogs when I can, and will try to post some more Making Space posts before the whole experiment ends in less than a month for me now.

The reason I haven't posted for a little while now is mostly due to busyness, but to be honest, I've had some struggles emotionally as I'm nearing the time for the closing of my brother's estate.   Closing the estate isn't the cause of my emotional struggles, but in going through records to do some final accounting and prep for next tax season, I have experienced some emotional "triggers" I didn't anticipate.  And there have been some hard days where the rug has felt pulled out from under me emotionally and even spiritually. 

On one hand, I've wanted to write about it here - to be known, to document my process, even to be beneficial for others who have perhaps dealt with loss that comes out of a complicated situation and family dynamic.  On the other hand, I've not wanted to inadvertently invite advice or even sympathy that is based on incomplete knowledge - because I don't feel I can share enough for a reader to really understand the situation.  I know... that was quite circular.  And round and round it goes in my head.

So I don't write much here about my loss and the head- and heart-work of dealing with it.  I may some day.  Or maybe not. For now I write this as much as a documentation for myself as anything - to record the existence of profound loss and often crushing regret alongside the good of life that is happening.  That's the nature of loss.  Of grief.  Of deep regret even, I'm learning.  Good often runs parallel to confusion and chaos.  Happiness can be experienced adjacent to profound pain.  It occurs to me that this is, perhaps, a small glimpse of a spiritual redemption that I hope to someday see more fully.  On that note, I do want to say I've gained great comfort and spiritual insights from others who share their grief journeys in a public way.  You know who you are, and I thank you.

So... yes, things are hopping here.  It is, perhaps, the hoppingness that helps me handle the hard moments of late.  The reason behind the hoppingess will be shared soon enough, but not yet on that either.  😉

So...  with all that said, let me share my recent decluttering.

Curious how many of you may have one of these around:

After 41 years, I finally opened up my hermetically-sealed wedding dress.

The blue around the yoke is tissue paper.  Someone seeing the picture thought it was fabric, so I thought I should clarify.

While it looks pretty in the picture (and I assume it did in person), my dress was not an heirloom-type dress.  It was made of polyester, and I bought it off the clearance rack in 1980.  I wanted something pretty, but I wasn't into the idea of spending a crazy amount of money on a dress I would wear exactly once.  Always practical - that's me.  Even so...  in 1980, off the clearance rack, I think it cost a little over $100.00.  I probably waffled over spending that much.

Anyway, the dress had at least one dark stain after 41 years of baking in different attics, and the white lace has myellowed to a beautiful shade of cream, but it made using the dress for some other purpose (other than a Halloween costume, perhaps) pretty much out of the question.  So I cut the skirt off, and am saving the still-intact bodice for now, and will hopefully remove the lace someday and make something else pretty out of it. 

I don't imagine it's the most beautiful of lace patterns, but it feels special since it's mine.  It's actually fairly substantial in weight so if I can remove it intact, I may find it has many uses.  We'll see!

Also, I saved a long skirt's, and a short train's worth of the lining fabric - I'm thinking it's probably taffeta.  Probably polyester, too, but it's a woven fabric - stiff and thick enough to provide some shape to the knitted polyester of the dress.  Not sure what it will be good for, but for some reason I felt compelled to save it. 😊  

That's all for this week.   

Making Space Week 48:  878 things gone!

Comments have been disabled for this post.  To anyone who commented and came back to read my response (which I usually leave), I have edited portions of one paragraph above that I think might have been better left unsaid for now.  Please trust that all comments were received in the generous spirit they were given, and I have saved them for my personal benefit.  Your kind comments are jewels to me. I just rethought the idea of having a comment section on this post. Thank you, kind readers.

Making Space...

Earlier today the video below popped onto my Youtube feed.  It's six months old, but its topic is timeless.

In this video Dawn fleshes out the concept of The Silent To-Do List, but gives credit to where she got the idea (the video below). 

Original video found at Simple Victoria: 

And Victoria got the idea from the book, Goodbye Things by Fumio Sasaki - which I'm now listening to on Hoopla.  

I think Dawn does a great job of simplifying and at the same time giving some very good everyday examples of things that end up on our Silent To-Do Lists.  The concept immediately resonated with me.  BTW, you might want to skip to 1:30 in the first video, though, just to cut to the chase.   And Victoria has some real gems in her video too.  

Seriously... if you're ever lagging in decluttering motivation, I suggest checking out this not-so-obvious idea.  

~~~~~

To be honest, though, I came up with this week's haul before watching the videos, but the idea of a silent to-do list is still very relevant.

First up, I went through a small storage cabinet in the garage this week, and emptied at least half of the cabinet:

Normally, I don't count recyclables, but I had put several more glass jars in this cabinet than I photographed.  For some reason I was collecting them out there and they were taking up space.  A few went under the kitchen sink for putting grease or other food stuffs in that I don't want going down the drain and the ones pictured got recycled.  And I just want to point out that this is a second ice cream bucket that has surfaced during this clean out. 😄  Otherwise, like most of my decluttering, I found quite number of little unremarkable things to rehome.  Thirty things in the picture above.

And then I remembered that I had decided some weeks ago to get rid of a shoe box full of CD's we'd obtained many years ago when attending and working at homeschool conventions.  Working meant we didn't have time to attend as many workshops, so we brought home bunches of recordings to make up for what we missed.  Some of these might have even gotten listened to.  😉  I can't help but think we have more than this somewhere in the house, but so far this is all that has surfaced:

Here's where I'm applying this concept of the Silent To-Do List:  I've held this collection of CDs back from my weekly Making Space posts because it is very tempting to think that I might like to listen to some of these recordings - not everything is homeschool related, and there are some topics that I might honestly find interesting still at this point in my life.  But you know what I'm going to do?  Scrub that idea out of my brain, and erase it from my Silent To-Do List!    What a relief!  Simply deciding up front I'm not going to listen (or re-listen) to some old CDs makes my to-do list 36 things shorter!  😃

If you're at all curious about this concept, watch the first video above especially.  And then look around and see what you can remove from your Silent To-Do List!

Making Space Week 46:  877 things gone!

Making Space...

With comfortable weather upon us, it was into the garage yesterday and today for just a little bit each day.  I think there will be yet another foray into this space soon, but for today's post, I am divesting myself of most of my silk flowers and greenery I store for seasonal decorating, but when it comes right down to it, I don't really use most of it.  Some items still have tags on them.  

Out it goes!

Most of it, anyway.  I saved aside a few pieces that I may find useful, but largely I'm done with silk flowers and fake plant material.  For now.  

I have no idea how many pieces are in the tub in the second picture above, but I count 10 different types of flowers or plants in the first picture.  Individually, there are probably nearly a hundred pieces (from the largest to the smallest), but I'm going to count 20 things gone from this category and call it good.

While outside, I took a picture of two 4-H posters two sons completed for Shooting Sports.   I asked them if they wanted them and I got a "Geesh!  You still have those?"   😆

Outta here!

I brought some boxes of miscellaneous stuff inside to sort through and I'm happy to count 10 items above (in all that fake greenery, there are at least 3 separate pieces).  

And one bow made of PVC pipe.  At least one of our boys enjoyed making these (and arrows from wooden dowels and some material for feathers) many years ago (when a young teen).  I think he may have sold a few to friends.   If son doesn't want this for memory's sake, it's leaving.  As much as it makes me smile remembering him making these, one way or another it's leaving.

Now... what I'd like to know is why there were these five Better Homes and Gardens magazines, dated from 2009 - 2012 amongst the stuff in the garage.  That one is a head scratcher. I'm assuming I just tossed them in a box to clean off a surface once upon a time, but they've been in that box for at least nine years (according to the newest date on the magazines).  Sigh.  The other things are just random stuff used at some point in homeschooling.  I did put a couple of books found in this box on the shelf.  You know... for those yet-to-appear grandchildren.  😉  

Not pictured are a couple of boxes of memorabilia that look like they're full of stuff from from my side of the family.  Since that's a project that will slow me down, I'll probably not sort through them right now.  Just quickly glancing at the contents of those boxes, I honestly didn't even know I had those things.

I think it's obvious more than 41 things are leaving the house with this post, but that's what I'll count - and be happy about it.

Making Space Week 45:  811 things gone!

Welcome, September...

'Twas a busy week last, but I got in some crocheting and even finished a few projects.   

I made two more little doilies from the book 99 Little Doilies.  First up is Doily #56:

I'm calling this "Garden Web"

It measures 5 1/2 inches across

And immediately following that was Doily #81 - which measures in at a whopping 4 inches across (at its widest):

Thanks to suggestions below, I'm naming this one Pretty Little Bird House

Marsha asked me once how many doilies from the book I've finished, and today I counted 14 different patterns I've crocheted.   I don't intend anymore to complete all the doilies in the book (necessarily), but it will be fun to make the ones that appeal to me  - and there are plenty that do.

After I finished the little doilies, I decided to make a pattern I had printed out some time ago.  It's called Dawn Glow:

While Dawn Glow isn't as tiny as #81, it only measures 8 inches across.  It will be a pretty little doily to create a vignette with some ceramic bunnies and maybe a little plant next Easter time.

The pattern was a little unconventional (from what I'm used to). I'm used to symbols which tell me where to repeat the pattern (kind of like music notation, but different), where this designer just trusts a person to know where the repeats begin and end.  That said, many people who made it found the pattern easy, so there is that.  Fortunately, it's not a complicated doily and I was able to ad lib when I hit a snag.  I made notes in case I wanted to do it again, but honestly...  I'm not even sure my notes are correct.  

And then the last round was pretty much a total departure from the pattern, but except for a missing picot or two, it works.  I think this doily probably took me at least an hour more than it needed to with the different times I got stuck or decided to rework something.

It sounds like I wouldn't recommend the pattern. If you like making doilies, do give it a try. No one else complained in their project notes, so it really may just be me.

And that is all I've got for a Year of Projects post today.   The weather has turned glorious here in central Indiana.  After some rainy days (finally), the humidity is getting knocked down and the nights ahead look comfortable for sleeping with the window open.  Mmmm...  my kind of weather.   And our grass is green again!  It's amazing how quickly a yard can go from crunchy yellow to luscious green after a couple of good soaks.  

That said, my heart goes out to those still suffering the aftereffects of Hurricane Ida - from the gulf coast to the eastern coast.  What a shock and devastation that storm was for so many.  

And I know many are still praying for the safe return of  Americans and allies still in Afghanistan.  The stories that are making their way out are heartbreaking.

On that note, though, I was excited to learn that several thousand Afghan refugees are being temporarily housed at a National Guard base just a few miles south of my little town.  They are being quarantined for two weeks, and then will be allowed to leave for more permanent housing.  I know many (maybe most) will leave the area, but regardless of where they end up, it makes me happy to know (and hope) that Indiana is one of the soft  places they've landed on their journey to making a new home here in the U.S.

And that is truly all I have for today.

I hope you have a good week!

Making Space...

Early in the week, I went through a medicine cabinet and gathered together stuff that had expired (mostly things like lotions or weird one-time prescription items someone had and didn't use all of).  Then Hubs came along and decided to discard what I had boxed up to take a picture of.  

I was annoyed at first, but then decided it's just as well - twenty year-old calamine lotion isn't very photogenic.  

Though I have to tell you...  I found three small containers of our sons' baby teeth!   I'm saving those to give to them just to see them laugh, and I imagine they will then discard them.  I'm amazed I saved them all. 

So, while most of that stuff is now gone with no picture to document it (and I'm thinking some of you are thankful now), I'm counting 10 items purged from the medicine cabinet.

Then mid-week painting started happening here.  With a few rooms turned upside down to accommodate that, I didn't imagine I'd have anything to show for a Making Space post this week, but hubs decided to help out by telling me he had more empty slide trays:

Whoa!  That's a lot of trays that represent a lot of slides that either got digitized or tossed this year. I think, though, we're all done.  Well... until I let the last 15 or so go that I'm still saving my family slides in.  Until I can make some prints or be utterly convinced they are saved properly, I'm hanging onto my family slides.  Total slide trays leaving this week:  37!

~~~~~

And I remembered that before things got all messy here (for painting) I had collected some plastic serving dishes from the furnace room that I hadn't used since youngest son graduated from high school. Let's see... how long ago was that?  Seven years ago!?!?!   How could that be?  

Quick! Outta here before I change my mind. 

A few of you are downright pretty. 

It's not that they're not perfectly usable, but the fact is, I haven't used them since our three sons' graduation parties (that I can recall), so I'm pretty sure I'm not going to miss them.  I bid them adieu and hope they bless someone else who's going to go to (or host) more gatherings than I am these days.  When I go to a potluck or pitch-in I rarely take items on trays.  It always seems I'm lugging a big ol' crock pot or large bowl of something or other.

So adding 7 plastic serving pieces and 2 Tupperware shakers, I've got 56 more things leaving!

~~~~~

And finally here, I need to readjust what week I'm on.  I don't know where I miscounted (probably - when I took several months off), but as I look at the calendar, I see I have 8 more weeks in this year-long challenge.  Which would make this week 44.  So yay me!  I have more time to reach or surpass my goal of 1000 things gone.

Just for inspiration, these are areas I want to go through yet:

My clothes closet - as the weather turns cool I'll naturally have a reason to go through it again.  And I have imaginings of being ruthless this time. 

The garage - I'm planning on rehoming some seasonal decorative stuff I am storing out there.

The laundry room and furnace room - these two spaces are adjoining and miscellaneous things are purposely stored there, and sometimes things just migrate there.

Books - we're still looking for our next home, and I'm pretty sure we're not going to end up moving to a house that has room for all the books and bookshelves we own, nevermind that I won't likely live long enough to read them all, so why not pare them down now rather than later?  Much easier said than done, but I'm still eyeing them with the thought to rehome more.

That's all from me on the Making Space front this week!

Making Space Week 44:  770 things gone!

Doilies and dishcloths...

It seems, at the moment, I can only manage a Year of Projects update every other week.  This past week I finally finished my Autumn Splendor doily:

Nothing much to say, really.  Except that I kind of want to make another one, in a different color.  Why?  Just because.

I'll wait a couple of days to see if the feeling passes.  

~~~~~

I snapped the picture below back in May and I thought I might finish up a bunch of knitted cloths by the end of the month:

 

Nearly 4 monhts later, I did finally manage to use up most of the yarn above.  These dish/wash cloths will go into my stash for some yet to be determined destination:

It seems a bit frivolous to be posting about such mundane things as doilies and dishcloths this weekend.  

Like most of us, I suppose, it seems my mind is continually on the chaos and heartache of people desperately wanting and trying to escape from Afghanistan, and now on our own country's southern shores today Hurricane Ida is threatening people's businesses, homes and, no doubt, lives.  

All the while COVID continues to wreak havoc - in our small town we've heard that our local hospital is routing sick people to towns over an hour away, because there are either not enough beds or workers to manage the influx of patients.  Several friends of ours have gotten terribly ill this time around.  The COVID Delta variant seems to be lurking around every corner - more so than ever before.  

And we mustn't forget that the people of Haiti are dealing with the after effects of an earthquake two weekends ago - followed by tropical storm, Grace.  Seems like a ridiculous name for a storm, if you ask me.  But it prompts me to pray that grace abounds for survivors there who are trying to recover.  

If there is some other massive tragedy I'm not remembering at the moment, feel free to include it with a comment, if you like.  I'm praying for all in harms way.  It seems the very least I can do.  

I'm sorry if this is all too heavy for what is normally a lighthearted post.  Heavy is what my heart is feeling right now, but at the same time, I wanted to connect with blogging friends.

I hope you have a good and safe week ahead. 

Making Space...

I decided to go through all my kitchen cabinets and drawers this week, and I was pleasantly surprised to find that I don't have a lot of superfluous stuff in there.  I imagined I would have all sorts of strange things in the deep recesses of a few hard-to-reach corners of my old kitchen cabinets, but I didn't.  Not much anyway.

That said, I did manage to painlessly purge some items that I never seem to use, or that are old and I have better versions of:

I'm not going to itemize everything, but I'd like to highlight a few things.  First of all, an old plastic ice cream bucket that's probably 20 years old (or more).  Normally, I wouldn't count garbage or recyclables in my Making Space challenge, but this bucket has been under my kitchen sink holding an odd collection of sponges, non-abrasive scrubbing pads, plastic scrubbies, rubber gloves (that I rarely use) and some cleaner I was given when we bought our glass top stove - 15? years ago.  I haven't used it since discovering how effective vinegar and baking soda are.  I threw away the old stuff, and put what I'm keeping in a nice rectangular basket I had in my stash so everything fits much better.  And I'm finally recycling this relic of bygone days when we use to buy ice cream by the bucket-full for our family of five.  

Also, there's a jar candle that needs disposing of. Again, normally, I'd just clean out and recycle the jar and not mention it, but this candle has taken a long time to burn down.  It's cause for celebration, so it gets counted.   The paper napkins are being removed from storage and put where we will use them up, but everything else is either being donated, tossed or recycled.

And I spent some time this week going through more Taste of Home Magazines...

And I culled through my recipe files and am recycling duplicates of recipes, or recipes that no longer look like something I'd fix.  I'm counting the pile of cards as one thing gone.  I have 22 TOH magazines above that will soon make their way to the library free shelf so added to the kitchen stuff in the first picture, I'm getting rid of 54 things this week!  

Making Space Week 45:  714 things gone!