The Year in Review, my top 25

Now, this post will not necessarily be about world events - mostly it will be about MY world's events in 2010. A year of ups and downs, for sure. Mostly it ended up being a good year. Hope you enjoy the roller coaster ride!

1 - My beloved Grandpa and Grandma died within 6 weeks of each other. This was quite shattering to our small family and really, the first deaths of any relatives to whom I was very close. Sorry to start out with such a bummer...It gets happier...

2 - We went on a faaaabulous vacation to Tortola:
We are soon to be going to Tortola briefly on our way to Jost Van Dyke, another of the British Virgin Islands. LOVE Jost! We'll be there in a mere 36 days!

3 - The hubby and I celebrated the 10th anniversary of our first date on Valentine's Day! Yay for us!

4 - We helped a family who was here from Haiti. Until they totally took advantage of our niceness and used a gazillion minutes on the cell phone we lent to them. There were literally like 20 calls on there a day - sometimes with a call lasting over an hour. Our phone bill was astronomical and the mother appeared to be somewhat of a scammer. Oh, well! Live and learn.

5 - Spring came early in 2010! March was divine and I even had crocus sprouting:And here they are three days later:
This was quite seriously the best growing year I can remember!

6 - Ricky Martin came out.

7 - I got sick.

8 - I got better.

9 - I had mystery plants - a false indigo: And much later in the season, a saponaria.


10 - We started the process of adoption! And, there is no new news. Still waiting for our social worker to complete our home study. It takes a long time...

11- I rescued a baby bird that made my friend, June, over there at Bye, Bye Pie wildly jealous! Unfortunately, the birdie did not make it, but I tried my best.

12 - Sadie almost died. She had to have an emergency splenectomy because a large tumor had grown so big, it ruptured her spleen. That was one scary-ass day, pardon my French. She recovered quickly from her surgery and this is a picture of her just two days after the surgery:
What ya doin' mom?

13 - It was my BIRTHDAY!

14 - I had really pretty flower boxes!

15 - We went to England:
And SPAIN! I LOOOOOVED Spain:


16 - The hubby and I had a great trip on our boat. We went down the coast, through the Cape Cod Canal:

to an adorable harbor in Quisset, MA - in Buzzard's Bay:

Through Wood's Hole:
And then over to Martha's Vineyard:
We fished, we swam, we read, we cooked and we had a really, really wonderful time!

17 - I bitched a lot about the weather. It was the hottest, most humid summer. Blech.

18 - Within a two week span, a cute guy told me I was "adorable" and then two young dudes whistled at me and yelled out to me that I had "nice legs!" These were thrilling events. How pathetic!

19 - I totally screwed up my back. Started going to the chiropractor. Really pathetic!

20 - TWO Mexican restaurants opened in Salem. This erases everything bad that happened the entire year!

21- Sadie has dementia. And started pooping in odd places like the couch where she sleeps, my car and the dining room. Not good. We are going to put her on a medicine that is given to Alzheimer's patients. It works well in 70% of cases, so let's all cross our fingers and toes for THAT. Jeez!

22 - We had an epic Halloween party again! I was rockin' the Snooki outfit:


23 - I discovered Hyperbole and a Half! SO funny!

24 - We hosted a huge Thanksgiving.

25 - I gave myself this award:
Because everyone deserves an award for SOMETHING, right?

And that about sums up the year!

We are having dinner with some really good friends later and then will come back here to have some drinks and play silly games! A nice way to round out 2010.

I hope you all have a wonderful, safe New Year's Eve! Here's to 2011! Cheers!

Quickie Updatey

I have not been posting daily. I know. Bad girl.

I have been doing this and-a that and-a this and-a that. Cleaning, laundry, grocery store in preparation of our upcoming diet, exercising, and the list goes on... One of the things I had not wanted to do is take Sadie to the vet AGAIN. Our little girl's dementia is getting worse and in the last week and a half she has been having trouble remembering that she's house trained... Pooping in the house and even in the CAR! My, my.

Well, yesterday we went to the vet for them to draw blood to check her liver (because she's on the dog equivalent of ibuprofen), and they also tested her urine and it turns out that she's got a urinary tract infection on top of the dementia! So, I just returned from the vet and got some antibiotics to treat the UTI and we've also ordered this drug that is used on humans to treat Alzheimer's and senility.

Boy, this is fun!

Poor Sadie.
Losing her mind and control of her bladder - sort of losing it at both ends! Despite everything, she continues to make it her function in life to be as close to me as possible and now, of course, since it's snowy out, she asks to go out 356 times a day! That dog LOVES the snow!

Some of the signs of senility in dogs is losing track of their house training - check. Getting stuck in corners - check. Going to the wrong side of the door to be let in or out (i.e. on the "hinge" side vs. the "opening" side) - also check. And one of the last symptoms is failing to greet their owner or not caring about being pet anymore. Luckily, that has NOT happened, and she still just loves the crap out of me!"Hi Mom!"

In other world news, a friend of mine (she's 80) lost her husband early this week; he died of advanced prostate cancer. So, I'm afraid that's all for today...I have to change and go to the funeral this afternoon. Happy friggin' New Year, right? Why does it seem there is so much death and terrible things that happen to people during the holidays?

Anywho, I gotta run and get ready to go.

Hope you're all having a nicer time of it today!

Glad the New Year is around the corner. I have not been all that fond of 2010!

Here's to 2011! clink!

Ciao for now.

Blustery Blizzard

We got TOTALLY dumped upon. It snowed. A whooooole lot. We got something like a foot of snow and then wind gusts of 40-50 mph, so we have drifts that are huge! We couldn't open our front door today! My husband had to squeeze out and shovel out the front door just so we could take the dogs for a walk!

Meantime our cars are buried and the back door to get out to the parking area is nearly buried. It's going to be interesting getting everything all cleared out. Thing about New England is that the houses are very close together, so there really is no where to put the snow when we get dumped on like this!

Here's the scene in the parking area:
Those lumps are our cars!! Yikes.

And the back yard:

Pretty, right?

I had to put on my snow pants, boots, heavy coat, hat and gloves and then run around in the back yard to make pathways for the dogs!! Of course, Sadie came outside with me to "help" - she's good like that!

Anywho, Christmas came and went this year and I know I will sound like a bah-humbug, but I'm glad it's over. I'm ready for the new year to start and to get on a health kick and lose some of this weight. I'm going to be going on the South Beach Diet again in January. Much as I know that diets are not really the way to go for long-term weight loss, the South Beach Diet just works SO darn well! And, of course, I have to think about being in a bathing suit in less than six weeks! If that doesn't motivate me, I don't know what will!!

My poor husband is now going around the house sorting through drawers and closets. Massachusetts declared a state of emergency yesterday and it is still in effect, so no one is working today - and my husband doesn't know what to do with himself!

I was just gone there for a little bit - he just roped me into going upstairs to sort through clothes. I'm back now - our guys are here to dig us out...One of the advantages to condo living is the luxury of the condo association hiring someone else to do the horrible job of shoveling! Though we don't have a big yard, there is a LOT of sidewalk and then our three-car driveway that is TOTALLY blocked in with snow from the plows that have been out all night. Since there is limited space for the plows to put the snow, a lot of it ends up pushed into people's driveways. Not fun to shovel, let me tell you!

Ok...I'm going to get bundled up again and do a bit of cross country skiing! Might as well take advantage of the snow, right?

A bad case of the blahs

Today I awoke with the blahs. I just didn't feel like my happy self and, as my husband says, "That's okay!" It's just a strange thing when I'm not all "Wheee!" and "Yaaay!" about life in general. I know I'm lucky that that is my normal state of being, so it's a funny thing when I'm feeling "Huh" and "Whatever".

Of course, a LARGE conspirator in my lack of good mood was good old Aunt Flo. She really puts a damper on the party, you know? She's the downest of Debbie Downers. So, the hormones are raging, the cramps were a'cramping and it was sort of dreary and snowed a little today. I did get a lot accomplished, which is nice - the house is spotlessly clean now, dishes are done, laundry folded, I did a little walking and also got the last minute things I needed for Christmas.

Later this afternoon, I decided to look up some funny animal websites to get myself in a better mood and I ended up on one of icanhascheezburger's many affliliates called icanhashotdog.com. One of the first things I found was this smarty-pants professor at some college and his smarty-pants dog, a border collie, who has a vocabulary of over 1,000 words. Now, this is not funny, I thought! Why on EARTH is this on some cute, funny website that is supposed to cheer me up? This decidedly did NOT cheer me up as all I could think is that I, instead, have a dog with the IQ of a cucumber - and I'm insulting a wide portion of the cucumber population!

My dog has a vocabularly of 5. She knows her name. That's one. She knows sit. Sort of. She knows come. Kinda sorta. She knows treat. So that's now four. And she knows the word walk. That's it. That's her repertoire. FIVE WORDS.

How depressing is that?!!

Oh, and just for kicks, she forgot how to go down the stairs again today! That's fun. She stands at the top of the stairway, and moans and groans and whines. So my husband or I ALWAYS have to be there to help her down now in case she forgets - which happens randomly.

Meantime, Professor Smarty Pants up there probably has his dog vacuuming the house and reading him stories at the end of the day. Jeez.

In other world news, I still haven't wrapped all the gifts I need to wrap. I just have a few more to do - will do tomorrow. I will be also cooking some chicken breasts tomorrow for those of us who don't eat red meat...We are going to a family dinner thing with my husband's Stepmom's side of the family which we do every year. It's really fun and we all get along wonderfully. However, meat is the main course, so I generally end up cooking something else for the few of us who don't eat the mammals. I stopped eating all beef and pork when I was 18 and I never looked back! It's easy to do, and SO much better for you. I was a total vegetarian for a while, but really did miss the occasional piece of chicken or turkey burger, so that's my thing now.

Lastly, I have this word of the day thing that pops up when I hit the icon for the dashboard on my beloved computer. If you don't have a Mac, there are all these "widgets" that you can get for free like a weather widget or a tide widget, spelling games, calculators, convertors, association games (which I LOVE!) and then there's also the word of the day widget. I thought - wonderful, I'll increase my vocabulary and get all smart and clever.

Here are the words for the past three days:

Frostbite. Is this really a difficult word? Anyone unsure what it is? REALLY?

Thrall. Which means slavery or bondage. How am I supposed to work that into every day conversation now? Really??

Mephitic. The meaning is "Of noxious stench from atmospheric pollution." And here is their charming usage suggestion: "The air he inhaled was no longer pure, but thick and mephitic, -- he was in prison."

So for the last three days there has been some horrid word describing some horrid condition like losing three frostbitten toes, being in slavery and then breathing in disgusting, noxious air. Who are these cheerful people putting this stuff out there? LIGHTEN UP!

No wonder I've been feeling a bit down!

My earlier post today featured some cute goats hopping around to cute music - if you didn't watch it, please do! It's silly as all get out and brought a smile to my sour face today!

As I was discussing our need to now own cutes goat with my friend June over there at Bye, Bye Pie, the subject of fainting goats came up. Do you know of these? If you don't, please watch this:


You know, in a way, those goats remind me of my dog that forgets how to navigate the stairs. Maybe she's part fainting goat. That explains A LOT!!

Not sure if I'll have time to venture over here tomorrow to do a posty, so if not, I will bid you adieu and wish you a very Merry Christmas!

Ho Ho HO!

A GIGGLE with the GOATS Jingle Bells Holiday Performance

Merry Christmas from the goats and me!!



Much to do today, so will leave you with visions of goats dancing in your head!

Have a very Merry Christmas!

The colors? of winter

As I mentioned in my last post, we got our first proper snow yesterday and last night. Not too much maybe an inch or two and it's already commenced to melting. That's one thing I LOVE about living in MA. We stick so far out in the ocean, that we actually stay relatively warm and we rarely get big accumulations of snow that stay the whole winter. It's usually a cycle of storm, melt, nice, flurry, nice, storm, melt, nice...It's not like living in Michigan is what I'm saying where the cycle is snow, snow, snow, snow, snow, snow, snow, snow, summer, snow, snow, snow...

You may think I jest, but I do not!! I remember the city workers having to pile the snow up in the middle of the streets at times because they had no where else to put it! And they'd transport snow over to the parking lot of our highschool where we'd have these ginormous mounds that wouldn't melt until well into May!! We once had a huge snow storm on my BIRTHDAY! My birthday, you ask? The very end of MAY!

And Michigan is cloudy and gloomy all winter. I remember getting so terribly depressed there in the winters. So, end of story is that I really love MA for the above-mentioned facts and also that the winters are generally MUCH shorter. Last year I started planting outside in March! The ground is still rock solid in March in Michigan!

Luckily, today the meterologists were wrong and we ended up with a sunny and relatively warm-ish day! We were supposed to get more snow and it was supposed to be cloudy until Thursday, but we got a surprisingly nice day! So I just returned from a bonus power walk and am eating some delicious soup for lunch!

I remembered to take some pictures of the snow in the back yard today, too...Shall we see?

View toward the back:

Not quite as pretty as the summer pics, right? The lack of color is the hardest part of winter for me. I love the vibrant colors of the garden all summer, so this time of year we get to choose from a lovely variety of browns and grays. Thank goodness for evergreens!! In the back yard I have the daphne bush that stays pretty all winter (it's over there peeking in on the left) and my butterfly bushes have some green leaves that remain toward the base:
Those are my new wind chimes that sound so pretty, and you can see the green leaves on the butterfly bush there, too.

Here's a view toward the front of the yard:
Of course, Sadie is out there with me! She LOVES the snow and takes any opportunity given to go out and lay in the snow! Both dogs are so built for the cold, they just adore the winter!

In other world news, there is a local jewelry store here that deals in very high quality gems. They have a limited number of earrings, necklaces, etc. I found the world's most beautiful blue topaz drop earrings. I am coveting them. So far I have been able to resist. They are similar to THESE, except the ones I want are less money and have tiny diamonds in a circle all around the topaz stone. Aren't they so pretty?

Ok. Gots to run. More errands to finish up today and then have to finish wrapping everything. One of the more challenging items to wrap is a gift requested each year by my husband's little brother. He gets a dozen boxes of the Keebler Grasshopper cookies - the chocolate mint ones! I wiped out two stores to get them this year!! hee hee!! Ahh, the little things in life!

Hope you're all having a fine, fine Tuesday!

Merry Ho Ho!

Pretty posies and proper precipitation

Today we got our first "proper" snowstorm where it sticks and you have to clean off your car and everything! Wow! Not too bad that our first snow wasn't until Dec 20th this year! I know other parts of the country have been utterly slammed with snow! So glad it didn't do that here!

Now, mind you, it's actually quite pretty out there - when the snow is all white and pristine and then you've got the Christmas lights and everything, it's pretty! Looks all cozy like the scenes on Christmas cards! But then the dirt trucks go by and the salt trucks and then the plows and then it just gets to be this sloppy gross brownish mess! Not so pretty, so I always try to appreciate the prettiness when it first arrives:

That's looking out to our parking area. The snow had just starting coming down in these photos.

This is the current scene:

It's totally dark out, so I hope you get the gist of it from these! It gets dark at noontime now (feels like it sometimes!), so I often forget to take pictures earlier in the day while it's still light enough to take a decent photo!!

In other world news, I bought TULIPS today at the grocery store! Nothing cheers me up more instantly than the sight of tulips! I have a small arrangement by the sink:

And one on the far side of the kitchen that leads into the piano area and living room:


I also have a vase full of them in the living room, but it was too dark in there to take a decent photo.

In other planty news, the eggplant is still thriving:


The bad news? The grape tomato plant that I so carefully and lovingly rooted and then planted? Oh, it bit the dust BIGTIME!! It went from looking decent to looking a little eh? And then it went from looking eh to "Oh, no!" and then directly to PFFFFT - dead as a doornail.

Are doornails really dead? Were they ever living? Some sayings are so strange, right? Happy as a clam is another strange one. Who deemed them happy? I think they honestly have a downright depressing existence! All stuck in the mud, squirting for their entire lives, no contact with other clams.. And talk about the claustrophobia! No room to move, no ABILITY to move, and your house is a SHELL! No protection from the elements! No insulation! No heat or air conditioning! Indeed, clams could not POSSIBLY be happy! (Can you tell I have a bit too much time to think about such things?!!)

So, that's all I got for today. I've been running around all day just like the rest of the U.S. of A. getting the last minute things for the holidays. Now, we are going to start dinner!

Happy Holidays! Hope you are happy as a cla...Wait. Happy as a...

Oh, forget it.

Honoring Sgt. James Ayube II

I did not know him and I do not know his family. All I do know is that he made the ultimate sacrifice in doing what he loved and what he believed.

My heart goes out to his family, his friends and his fellow Corps men and women. I cannot imagine how terrible you all feel. I know that today as the casket and funeral motorcade made their way through our little community there were thousands of us lining the streets with flags in his honor. The significance of what he gave in service to your country was not lost on any of us. It was very sobering and moving. Most of us were crying as the procession went by. We are all so very sorry for not only his family's loss but also our loss as a community.

Sgt. James Ayube II was a role model, a medic, a loving husband, brother, son and community member. Those who knew him only had the highest praise for how he lived his life.

He posted his favorite poem on facebook shortly before his death:

If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;

If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain;

Or help one fainting robin,
Unto his nes again;

I shall not live in vain.

- Emily Dickenson

What to do with leftovers

A couple days ago, I was a bit restless and tired of it being so cold that I couldn't comfortably do anything outside, so I finally broke down and bundled myself up in the most ridiculous looking way and went outside and commenced to fixing up the flower boxes and finally putting together the little wreath for our back door. I had had all this greenery laying around in my car - leftovers from jobs - bits of some sort of pine, boxwood, and some incense cedar. I also had three packages of rosehips that I had originally bought for my neighbor's garland, wreath and planter, but I decided to go with pepperberry for her instead.

For the baby wreath, I added a few accents with the pine, boxwood and cedar to the base:
It's simple and cute and just right for that door.

Our planter got an upgrade this year!I don't usually do it up in such a fancy way, but I had the greens and the gumption to do it! I love the curly willow in there - it give it a bit more oomph!

I started doing all of this stuff a couple afternoons ago in between walking the dogs and then walking to the restaurant to meet my friend for dinner. I had a two hour window to do the wreath, fancy up the planter and then do all 6 flower boxes!

So, the wreath and planter were easy peasy. I can do that stuff in my sleep! The flower boxes, however, required a bit more attention, as they were filled with loads of grasses and other dead things. Not so pretty. So I went about the business of cutting back all the dead grasses and most of the other dead stuff in there. I did keep the mini-licorice - even though it is no longer alive, it is a pleasant silver color and adds some interesting shape to the flower boxes:


You likey?

I ended up using all of the greens and then added the rosehips and finished them off with a couple types of preserved flat-leafed eucalyptus and some preserved lemon-leaf that I also had in the house! They are certainly not my favorite flower boxes I've ever done, but they look worlds better than they did with the dead crap in them!!

Man, looking at those pictures outside, our house needs a good paint job again! Jeez!

In other world news, we went our tiny local theater to see a holiday play last night. It was not your usual cheeriness-for-the-holidays type play. It was downright sad and quite dark, but it was a nice way to spend an evening and the acting was really quite good!

I also did an hour yoga DVD yesterday to start my journey to lose as much weight as humanly possible before we go on our vacation in February. My good friend suggested an easy weight-loss method of cutting off a leg, but that's really not the look I am going for!! Anywho, I'm good and sore today from yoga and despite that fact, did over 40 minutes of walking! Yaay for me!

Ok...Off to take the dogs for their afternoon walk and then will settle in for a nice evening. We've been out jet-setting for the last couple nights, so I'm happy to have a nice, cozy night at home!

Hope you're all staying warm!

Later!

Update on Koty and other randomness

He's totally fine. In fact, by the time we had to load up and get into the car to go to the vet? He was totally waggy and fine and happy and jumped right up into the car. So, there ya go. He probably just pulled something or twisted his leg in a weird way and all it took was a little bit of rest and he was good to go!

In other world news, it is SO COLD HERE. Yuuuuucccccckkkkkooooooo! Hate hate hate the cold. The weather website I use, accuweather.com, tells me it is currently 18. Wind chill brings it to MINUS THREE. Is this really necessary? I was completely fine with it being 50 degrees the other day. Even 40 is do-able. This crap we're having today? NOT fine. NOT do-able. Ridiculous is what it is.

Last night I walked to one of our favorite restaurants to join a friend for dinner. Walking TO it was cold enough, but then walking home was literally painful. My legs HURT by the time I got home and I had on a big down coat, jeans, a big scarf, a hat and gloves. I was prepared, but the cold was able to permeate even all of those layers.

The GOOD news is that we booked our annual winter trip a few days ago! We are heading to Jost Van Dyke in the British Virgin Islands. Jost (pronounced YOHST) is heaven on Earth, my friends. We have been there before and it is just incredibly awesome. It's the most laid-back island you can possibly imagine. There are no locks on doors, crime just basically does not exist. HEAVEN.

Here is a live webcam overlooking the beach from this world-famous little bar/restaurant called The Soggy Dollar. The reason it is called that is that you can only reach Jost by boat. So, in order to get to the bar, most patrons are on their private boats that are moored off the beach, they swim in, and therefore, their dollars are soggy! They have a clothesline that runs along the back of the bar where they hang the soggy dollars to dry! It's a hoot!

Anyway, we stay on the side of the island where there is one of the most stunning stretches of beach in the world along White Bay. This is the view from the hill where our villa is:
Is that not stunning?

The Soggy Dollar bar is on White Bay, as is another really amazing little bar called Ivan's Stress-Free Bar. While you stay on Jost, you can go into Ivan's and, most times, there is not a bartender. You make the drinks yourself and then there is a notebook where you keep a tally of whatever you make while you're there for the week or however long, and then you just pay up at the end of the week. Seriously. Is that not the coolest thing? Love the honor system!

Anyway, I could go on and on about Jost, but I must bundle up myself and get the dogs out for a walk. Some of us that live in this house actually relish the cold since they are built with the thickest fur you can imagine!

Later we are going to a play at the newish Salem Theater Company.

Hope you are all having a good week!

Ciao!

It's frickin FREEZING!

It's a balmy 27 outside right now. It was 50 yesterday, so we've basically lost 1/2 of that. Oy. With the wind chill, the weather website I use says it's the equivalent of 16 degrees outside. I do not like this, I don't appreciate it, and no one asked if this would be okay! If asked, I would have said a resounding "Absolutely not!" Not nice, Mother Nature. Not nice.

On top of this coldness we are again experiencing, something happened to our dog Koty's leg today. We were merrily going along on our walk, he was running about as he is wont to do despite being nearly 12 years old, and then suddenly - poof - his demeanor and his body language changed. Something was amiss. It appears to be something in his front left leg, so we are on our way to the vet in a little while. Poor little guy. When you rub his leg, he just whines. He's not a whiner AT ALL, mind you, so this is highly unusual. Hopefully it's just a pulled something or a sprained something.

In cheerier news, I got new boots! I didn't realize they were simply kind of dressy-for-fun boots and they are decidedly NOT warm, but they are cute as all get-out:
They have very cute details, like the little strap held down by a silver stud, and then there are two little bangle things that I didn't even realize were there when I ordered them! PLUS they are PINK on the inside!
CUTE!!

I wore them this morning to walk the dogs and my feet just about froze to death, but I looked cute!! : ) hee hee!

In flower-ish news, the amaryllis from the grocery store has three huge blooms and there are two more to come!

The eggplant continues to grow:


And I finally remembered to take a picture of the finished product at my neighbor's:
The wreath, garland and planter all look so pretty, don't they?

Ok. I best be off - have to clean out the back seat of my car for my poor hurt doggie.

Wish us luck...

Later!

Not too much, you?

Today I am tired. I spent all weekend zipping about, doing this that and the other. Saturday I was the decorating queen! My friend over at Nothing Worth Stealing, who is a fantastically gifted artist, does all of my ads and marketing pieces for my business. So, in return, I do her decorating! I did up a pretty wreath for her and two planters. Of course, I forgot to bring along a camera, so I will have to take photos of her pretties and then also my other client whose planters and wreaths I did a couple weeks ago...

Anywho, in order to do these things, I had to go to my beloved Marblehead Garden Center to buy the wreath base, some more juniper and then for our house I got a pretty garland for our front door and a small, simple wreath for our back door. (Which reminds me - it is still sitting in my car!) While at the Garden Center it occurred to me that we were supposed to put up the Christmas tree on Sunday and the weather was supposed to be rather yuck (which it was - warm but VERY rainy and windy), so I decided to pick up a tree while I was there, as well...

Here's the garland and the wreath out front:
Pretty, no?!!

So, off I went to decorate my friend's house with the tree on the roof of my car...Flew home, and my husband was nice enough to hang the garland out front and get the tree set up for me (he is not one who enjoys this type of thing, so it was nice that he did it willfully and cheerfully!) while I FINALLY got around to decorating my neighbor's garland that I hung up over a week ago! Jeez.

Then I finally finished putting the pretty, white sparkle lights on the bushes on the side of our house. It all looks very festive and pretty...To end the day, I made the MOST delicious spicy chicken enchiladas! Yummm!

Yesterday I wrapped 3,852,00 presents (felt like it!) for the DCF kids we and our friends sponsored, collected gifts from the other friends who had wrapped gifts themselves and then went about the business of decorating the tree. Here's the finished product:



After we finished the tree, we ordered wonderful Indian food from our local eatery, A Passage to India. Their menu is on there if you want to see what's in the goodies we got...We ordered Dal Maharani, Chicken Saag, some raita and extra onion chutney (I'm crazy for it!) and then we also had vegetable samosas for appetizer. TO. DIE. FOR!

After all the running around and zippy zooming, I'm just plain tired out today!

Despite that, I did manage to do a power walk (it was 50 degrees here again today!) and then just got back from my chiropractor who reports that my back and neck are significantly better! Yaay!

So, that's all I gots for this fine Monday. Dinner is now in the oven (roasted chicken with potatoes, onions and carrots and some squash) and we are going to settle in for a nice, quiet evening.

Later, kids!

Christmas is coming, isn't it?

I seriously need to stop procrastinating! I must must must get the decorations out, the Christmas tree decorations, the lights for outside, finally got the wrapping paper out today, have three million gifts to wrap and many to send by mail...

I'm really weird about it this year - it just doesn't feel like the holidays to me. Thanksgiving was like a month early for me and now Christmas is about 2 months early! I don't know why my brain is not registering that it is actually December the 10th, but it's just not jibing in my peabrain that it is REALLY going to be Christmas. In two weeks. 14 days. AArrrrggghhhhh!!!

This is what my dining room table looks like right now:My husband and I went out yesterday afternoon and bought gifts for 13 kids who are in the care of The Department of Child and Family Services (formerly DSS). Our lovely neighbor who works for the post office in Peabody does this each year with his fellow co-workers. They organize this toy drive for over 1000 children. It's pretty amazing. Anyway, we have great friends who either gave us money to help buy the 13 gifts we bought, and then there are 14 other gifts that other friends bought themselves that will also be delivered to the needy children.

It's a good thing to do and makes me feel a little bit happier for these children whose lives have been turned upside down and had to be removed from their homes. Sad, but most times the very best thing for these kids.

On a flowery note - take a gander at the Thanksgiving flowers STILL looking pretty on the table up there! Amazing!

In other flower news, the Amaryllis that I bought at the grocery store on November 22 bloomed this morning! SO pretty:
Can you see the other 3 flower heads that are forming? So this guy is going to give be a quadruple bloom! Sweet!


I also had to buy this irresistible little poinsettia the other day:
I love the dusty pink color of this.

And, my other amaryllis is coming along nicely:
He's a nice shade of green now and has grown about an inch since I brought it up from the basement!

I have to run now...Am on my way for a consultation with my doctor. She just changed locations so I have to re-establish myself as a patient by meeting up with her for an initial consult. Sounds like someone's trying to make some easy $$$, right?!!

Later, my friends!

Ciao.