Quilting Retreat is Relaxing, Productive

My quilting guild held its annual retreat this past weekend. It's about 36 hours of sewing, eating, laughter, and a little sleep. This year we went to Mercy Center in West St. Louis County and about 40 of us had a great time!


This year there were three short projects, called Optional Blocks, in addition to the main retreat project. Each of us also had the option of "doing our own thing" which is the option I chose. The first block above is my contribution to the first optional block contest on Friday night. All of the entered blocks are shown at left. One lucky guild member won them all to take home--and it wasn't me. I really liked these blocks and the technique was easy--no cutting out triangles and wrestling with bias edges. I might try to make a whole quilt this way myself some day...I have lots of scraps!

Saturday was sunny but cool, so most of us spent the day inside the auditorium room at the center. These photos are during the morning as people got ready to start on the main project.

Every one had a table mate which made it fun to get to know someone better. And yet you could see what everyone else was doing as well. Some people brought sewing machines that could do everything except make coffee. I brought my 1970 Singer Featherweight that has two stitches, but makes incredibly accurate 1/4-inch seams.

Some members brought individual projects. I can't show what I worked on yet, because it is going to be a surprise for someone who is expecting her first child soon. So I'll show what others worked on. This butterfly project was one of the most ambitious. Many parts that had to be sewn precisely. I admire someone who has the patience to do this!

The main project, taught by a guest instructor, was a pineapple block. At left is how she charted the various stages of construction for those who were doing the bock to refer to. Some did two or four blocks; one woman was doing 20! After I saw the results, I kind of wished I had made this project, but I also needed to finish some other work that I had started some time ago.



Beautiful batiks were popular, and these made a beautiful wall hanging after they were all assembled. I admire the color sense of my quilting friends, and wish I could do half as well.

A more tradi-tional color scheme was in progress in the photo at left. There is something timeless and perennial about the use of burgundy and green.

We sewed late into the afternoon and night, with a few breaks for stretches and in one case, general hilarity. Sarah, who looks so serious here, later went out and came back wearing a grass skirt and showing off her moves in a hula dance! The theme of the weekend was "Valley Girls Go to Hawaii."

More serious stitching from Lenore at left and Norma below. There was a constant hum of machines, broken by occasional music and laughter. After our last meal together on Sunday, people began to pack up and leave one by one. The weekend goes by so fast! I came home with a set of pinwheel optional blocks that I won in the last of the three drawings. I'll post a picture of them soon, along with my mystery baby quilt.

The Amaryllis Blooms for February

Earlier this week on Facebook I posted a photo of a single amaryllis blossom-- the first to come out on our gloomy, sleety Tuesday. Yesterday there were four blooms, although because of my camera angle, only three can be seen here.

The plant came from Norm's mother, who had one similar to this going all the way back to their days on the farm in Western Kansas. At least 60 years, maybe 70, by my reckoning. In the summer the pot containing it would go outside; I remember seeing it just outside the back door of their house in Colby, in the shade of the climbing rose trellis. The rest of the year it resided indoors and in the winter would send up multiple stalks, sometimes bearing 4 or 5 buds. The salmon color always struck me as unusual, because the potted amarylli you can buy in the winter in garden centers and hardware stores are usually red, rose, or white. Close to 40 years ago Mom gave me my very own bulb and over the years it has multiplied many times and I have shared it with myiad friends. I know that my sisters-in-law all have their own bulbs and we often compare notes to see whose plant is blooming first. Sometimes it has bloomed at Christmas, often in January around my birthday. This year this plant, the first of several I have, waited until Ground Hog Day. Another one is sending up a stalk that will bloom for Valentine's Day. Several others just seem to be waiting. I think they want to be repotted. It's hard for amarylli to be too crowded, but I think a actually have one pot that is. It's tricky because if you give them too much room between themselves and the side of the pot, they won't bloom at all. About an inch between the bulb and wall of the pot is the best.

This amaryllis is atypical in that all the leaves never die off at once, like most varieties do, and it never really goes into hibernation only to send up a flower in advance of new leaves. It sports shiny green leaves all year round, but when the oldest leaf starts to yellow, and then dry up, I start looking for the flower stalk. It is as though the leaf if dying and pouring all its nutrients into the flower. Two or three more leaves may do this as the flower emerges.

I have two other varieties of amaryllis. One is a gorgeous, fragrant rose and white beauty that a friend gave me years ago. It has only bloomed two years out of all the time I have had it. It probably needs something it isn't getting. Another is a creamy white/yellow variety that is very prolific...bulbs multiply like crazy and I have shared those, too. It is the kind that likes to lose all its leaves and sleep for a while in the winter before it blooms. I have some offshoots of it that have been asleep in their pots for over a year, so I'm not sure what will wake them up. Yet the bulbs are still firm so I know they are alive, in there, somewhere. A few years ago I had several of these creamy ones planted together in a plastic pot, and they expanded so much during the summer on the porch that they split it in two. Needless to say, that got my attention and I found two new pots and fresh potting soil to resettle them.

I believe the Latin name for our lovely salmon amaryllis is Hippeastrum striatum. I found a blooming specimen in the Climatron at the Missouri Botanical Garden with this name years ago. I'm not a botanist but the plant had exactly the same size, color and habit as ours. It was in bloom with several leaves on, in late January, in a ground level bed in the Garden's famed geodesic-domed greenhouse. The plant is a native of Brazil. I have no clue as to how a flowering bulb native to Brazil could have wound up on a window sill in Western Kansas sometime in the 1940s or 50s, and if anyone has a theory, please let me know. One of the color slides from the farm days shows it blooming on a kitchen window sill, and Norm remembers it being there in his childhood. Like so many stories, it raises more questions that may never be answered. But this amaryllis is a lovely reminder of my dear mother-in-law, of the ties that bind generation to generation, and the fact that some plants will probably outlive us all.

Winter Wonderland I

On Thursday afternoon, the aftermath of Tuesday's Big Storm was still sparkling in the trees. A half day of sunshine, but the sparkles overhead refused to melt. We could relax inside, enjoy warm ham and bean soup and admire the show.

I love my 10x zoom lens and the additional digital zoom on my little Canon Power Shot. As the sun was getting ready to set, I stood on the front porch in the 18-degree air and took not only the photo above but this one of the neighbor's house across the street, bathed in the glow of sunset. This is the home of the lady who feeds all the stray cats in the neighborhood--and a couple of them were sleeping on our porch chairs until Ava and Norm scared them off.

Since I posted two earlier views of this same scene, I thought I should show what it looked like at 7 a.m. this morning after about 3 or 4 inches of NEW snow fell overnight. We caught the tail end of the storm that buried Dallas and Tulsa yesterday. This snow was light, and as soon as it stopped falling, the wind scattered a lot of it off the trees.

Our backyard is still very popular with the avian community. As I focused for this picture using the zoom out one of the back upstairs windows, there was a lovely bright red cardinal on the top curve of the shepherd's crook. By the time I could trip the shutter, he was on the ground, munching on sunflower seeds!

By 2 p.m. we had clear blue sky and 34 degrees, and with a little more help from Barb, most of the driveway is clear. Norm says it looks like someone took a snow blower to the front sidewalks. That would probably be Buddy, who has been known to go all the way around the two block circle, about 7/8 of a mile, clearing a path for walkers so they won't have to exercise in the street. Barb ran some errands and brought us a dozen eggs--the only food stuff we are running low on. Now we are good until the next arctic blast in the middle of next week. We are so blessed in this village with amazing neighbors!

Groundhog Day, Digging Out

Right here in the immediate St. Louis metro, the dreaded historic three-day ice, snow and wind storm was much milder than predicted, for which we are thankful and feel very fortunate. Predicting these weather events is very tricky, because when storms approach St. Louis they tend to veer one way or the other, or sometimes just part, go around, and regroup on the Illinois side of the river. Some locals are griping, as though they feel cheated we didn't get 500,000 power outages (as we did in 2006) or 14 to 20 inches of blowing snow--as did Tulsa and Columbia, respectively! Here are some pictures of our event. Above, the redbud in the front yard had about 1/10 inch of ice clinging to it as it started to get dark on Monday afternoon. It turned out that batch of freezing rain was only supposed to be the warmup for the Main Event on Tuesday.

The finch feeder toward the back of our yard wore a bonnet of icicles that I kept warily watching all afternoon as the freezing rain continued to fall. All the birds were feeding furiously Monday morning before the precipitation started. We rounded up the kerosene heater, the sterno stove, batteries, flashlights, matches, candles and long underwear in case the worst happened. The weather service at this point thought we could have 1/2 to 1 inch of ice by Tuesday night. We felt certain that if the ice reached 1/2 inch we would be in for an outage because somewhere a line would break, despite all the recent tree trimming by the utility company.

Our electric company learned some hard lessons from the two storms in 2006, one in summer, one in winter, that crippled St. Louis for days--and kept some people in the dark for a week or more. They trimmed a lot, buried some lines, upgraded poles (and raised our rates to cover the expense.) On Monday they had called in extra crews from some other states so they could be ready to respond as soon as things started to happen. At 4:30 p.m. on Monday, this is what the view from the back door across our neighbor's yard looked like. We fully expected that it would be a lot worse by morning, or at the latest, Tuesday evening.

The big surprise on Tuesday morning was that the view was much like the night before, our ice forecast had been canceled and we were now under a blizzard warning for heavy, blowing snow. I have never been so glad to be under a blizzard warning in my life. I knew that even if we did lose power, the response would probably be swift, and as the day wore on, we were less likely to. The photo at left is the same view as above, taken at 10 a.m. today (Wednesday.) We did get more ice--a total of about 2/10 inch, but what helped was the sleet that fell most of the day on Tuesday, with only a little freezing rain.

Even so, the ice could have been a problem if we had gotten 40 mph winds last night, but those didn't arrive, and neither did the 7-10 inches of snow. So I could actually appreciate the beauty in this view. As usual, our fickle weather changed course as it approached the metro. Go 20 miles south of I-255, and there is a lot of icing. Go 20 miles west on I-70 and last night the highway was closed at Wentzville all the way to Kansas City because of deep snow and whiteouts. Go 20 miles north, same thing. People are still digging out, although 70 opened this morning although it was still snowpacked. I imagine the many trucks that had to idle overnight at truck stops in St. Charles County took care of that as they rolled west.

The best thing about sleet is that it doesn't stick to tree limbs and power lines. The worst thing about sleet is that it packs itself very densely on the ground, streets, roads, and sidewalks. It looks like snow, until you try to shovel it. This morning, an ice pick would have been handy. This front walk is partly clear because all day yesterday, every time Norm took Ava out front for business, he moved the sleet along with a snow shovel before it could harden. The total depth was about three inches by this morning. It took a man from our church and two teenage helpers over 4 hours to chip out our driveway and our walks and steps--as well as Barb's.

Meanwhile, the juncos and other birds were keeping the back yard dining table filled. There are little tracks in the 1/2 inch or so of snow on top of the sleet. Yesterday they were having trouble standing upright, the footing was so slick for them.

Our street went untouched yesterday. The schools were all closed, even the University two blocks away. But early this morning the snow plow and salt truck started making passes and by 11 a.m. the sun had come out briefly and it was enough to finish melting the street down to its bare surface. Our driveway isn't perfect, but clear enough to navigate now.

After a busy morning of supervising the shoveling crew, Norm and Ava curled up for a well deserved nap after lunch. I can still hear our other neighbor's drive being scraped and shoveled outside the windows as I type. We will have a very cold night tonight but maybe not as cold as first forecast--they are saying 1 above instead of 5 below. It is supposed to stay cloudy and not clear, which will help. As if at that temperature, 6 degrees really matters!

We also will welcome Barb home tonight; she finally got a plane out of NY. In this storm, as in others, we have been reassured by the way neighbors along the street stay in contact and check on each other and offer help if needed. Patti up the street took Ava for a walk on Monday when the walks were slick. She also offered to let us sleep over if we lost power, since her furnace has a switch to let her run the fan off a generator, which she was ready to use if need be. Although we have a generator, it is of more use for warm weather outages, since our heating system is boiler and hot water radiators, and not easily converted to run on auxiliary power. We are going to look into getting a gas-log insert for our non-working fireplace. I'm also considering replacing our aging electric stove with a gas one. And we are definitely ordering some yak trax or other cleat slip-ons for our shoes so we won't be in terror (well, so I won't be--Norm is more sure on ice than I am) of slipping and falling if we need to leave the house the next time one of these storms hits. Since climate is changing and making storms in all seasons more severe (just take a look at what has happened in Australia this season) we probably should begin to expect these kinds of events as the new normal. Today we are thankful for warmth, food, light, good friends and neighbors and above all, the loan of a warm puppy.

Wrapping Up January: Storm, Birthday and Thaw

This has been a really cold month--our $315 natural gas heating bill that came the other day can attest to that! On Thursday, Jan.20, the heaviest snow we have had in years began to fall. Late at night it was still coming down furiously, and I took this photo out of the study windows for a view of the back yard.

The effects of the January 20-21 storm were still visible a week later, on Jan. 28, when I took a photo of the icicles that were still clinging to the awnings outside the upstairs bedroom windows, although the depth in the yard had receded, and all the snow was off the trees. The light coming through them made them sparkle and glow from within. Later that day we heard a lot of loud crashes as icicles let go from the upper roof, hit the awnings, knocked these loose and slid on down. It felt like the January thaw had begun.

But I get ahead of myself. On Friday morning the 21st, the snow had subsided to flurries, but the result was dramatic. Our heated birdbath wore a 9-inch deep bonnet of new snow--but when Norm checked, there was an air hole on the side not visible from the house--and there was still water underneath all of that. The birds, of course, were ecstatic.

The effect of the accumulating snow and sculpting wind was really evident on our next door neighbor's back steps. Later in the day our friend Raymond and another man arrived to shovel all of this away, but until noon on Friday, we were pretty much house-bound, and had been for almost two days.


Early in the morning on the 21st, the snow still clung to the neighborhood evergreens, making a pretty winter scene. This snow was fluffy, not wet, and as soon as a light wind came up, it started to blow off of all the trees.





This particular snowy Friday was also my 68th birthday. In order to avoid a fire, Norm put one candle on the short stack of pancakes he made from scratch for our breakfast that morning! I had a wonderful birthday... after we could get out, we went to our Qigong exercise group at noon, and later went to Hill Brewing Co. in Ferguson for a tasty birthday dinner. It was pretty cold, though, and windy. The best part was getting scores of Birthday wishes via Facebook and e-mail. One of the blessings of our electronic age!

A tour of the premises on Saturday the 22nd again showed the depth of our snowfall. Safe under all that snow insulation are our spring bulbs, chrysanthemums and hostas. As well as a whole colony of moles that have been active in the front yard despite the best efforts of one of St. Louis's top pest control companies!

The house wore its mantle of snow on the roof for several days, and the afore- mentioned icicles hung on until the very end, when the temperature finally climbed above freezing on the 28th. We were able to get to church on the 23rd for services and a soup dinner after church. We also made it to two more night meetings this last week, and two more Qigong sessions. By Friday when I went to the grocery store, the temperature readout in the car said 46 degrees. It was almost shorts weather...

Birds have been busy at both feeders as well as their heated bird bath. In fact, Norm had to make a run to Wild Birds today to get them some more food. Good thing he did...the forecast for the coming week doesn't look good. This is one of several dozen juncos that call our yard the dinner table. We also have cardinals, doves, sparrows, chickadees, and the occasional woodpecker or blue jay. On Friday in the warmth I heard a robin clucking, even.

On Friday, the snow is still visible out the front bedroom windows, but the icicles are gone. And look who is thinking about blooming... the amaryllis is slower to bloom this year than usual. Maybe it knows that spring is going to be late?






In the sunny sewing room window, the geraniums have stopped blooming, but they greenly wait for spring, while the Euphorbia grows taller and sends out white blossoms. Unfortunately, earlier this evening the Weather Service issued a Winter Storm Watch for us for next week, Monday through Wednesday. Freezing drizzle, freezing rain, sleet, freezing rain, sleet, and then heavy snow. I really hope that 1/2 inch of ice they predict doesn't materialize. We had such drastic power outages in the ice storm of December 2006 that I don't want to go through anything like that again, especially with only a 25-pound goldendoodle to keep both of us warm! Thus our January winds to a close. We are still working on the 500-piece puzzle. Quilt blocks were made, but the guild meeting was canceled the night of the big snow. Genealogy research continues. Water exercise has resumed. Meetings have been attended. Plans are being made. Soup recipes have been tried. We still need to put away the Christmas decorations. I've lapsed from my two-post-a-week resolution. Weight has been gained. Muscle tone has been lost. Oh for the days when we can take long walks outside again! I am ready for Spring but Winter is still very much with us.

Remembering Haiti

Just below I have posted a link to Tara Livesay's blog about how her family experienced the earthquake a year ago. The Livesays returned to Haiti on New Year's Day after 8 months in the US.

Livesay [Haiti] Weblog: Remembering

Livesay [Haiti] Weblog: Remembering: "On 1/12/2010 at 4:53pm the landscape of Haiti was irrevocably changed. Despite great tribulation and loss the heart and spirit of ..."

What We Say, Play, Hear, Do and Think Does Matter

One of the few photos that show my playmates from childhood is this one, taken about when I was in second grade. I'm the one kneeling on the left. Gail is the other girl, on the right. She lived next door and was 2 or three years older than me. Danny (standing) lived on the other side and was about two years younger. Danny died of Hodgkin's lymphoma the fall when he was in the second grade, and I was in the fourth, so I know this was taken a year or two earlier. We had been playing cowboys and Indians, and either Gail's mom or another neighbor took our picture. We were some tough hombres in those days with our cap pistols locked, loaded, and raised for action.

I started thinking about this picture this evening, after watching NBC Dateline's hour-long coverage of the tragic shootings in Arizona, so I found it in an old album and scanned it. Right now one of the big debates is about how much influence the sometimes violent rhetoric of politics might have had on the shooter. A lot of people, some of my family and friends included, discount the effect of violence in song lyrics, movies, video games, and television shows on how unbalanced people decide to act out. So it's not surprising that already the Tea Party, Sarah Palin, and Congresswoman Giffords' opponent in the 2010 election who campaigned by inviting his supporters to fire an automatic weapon with him have all said that nothing they have said or done could possibly be responsible for the actions of the young man alleged to have committed this crime. After all, he appears to have a history of mental instability, so that's it.

I respectfully disagree. The three of us, me, Gail and Danny, were by all outward signs quite normal kids. We played with our cap guns and water pistols, and in my household at least, my father had a .38 revolver hidden in the top drawer of the dresser in the bedroom (I wasn't supposed to know it was there) as well as, later in life, my grandfather's .22 squirrel rifle and a couple of other long guns. So I am not one of those people who was never around guns but is now leery of them. When I was a teenager I shot a .22 at a Boy Scout/Girl scout skeet shoot and I scored better than all but one of the guys . (I was a good shot at archery, too!) But I think things are different today. For one thing, kids aren't outside on a December day playing any kind of game; they are inside watching television, surfing the Internet or playing a video game--or possibly doing all three at once.

When we three Tulsa kids were playing cowboy, all we had as imagery were a few movies like the Westerns my grandmother like to take me to, and some radio shows like The Lone Ranger or Hopalong Cassidy or Roy Rogers as role models. Our home didn't get TV until I was 13. We didn't actually see any blood, and we could get up after we "died" and play another day, just as the actors in the movies seemed to survive and show up in more movies, so they (and we) were immortal. We also had other things to do...like home chores and school work (yes, I had subtraction homework in the second grade!) and music lessons and Brownie Scouts. Yet, we were very capable of fantasizing ourselves into the roles we were playing. I don't have a stack of studies right here at hand to point to, just my own experience. Remember the girls who wanted to look like Barbie when they grew up, and how a few of them were willing to starve or binge and purge in order to get that figure? Remember watching Flashdance and dancing in your living room? Remember watching Esther Williams and imagining yourself a synchronized swimmer? Media of all kinds have always had an effect on the dreams and fantasies of those who watch and listen. Why then do we think that the roles our kids and young people watch today--many of them soaked and saturated with sex and violence--are not going to have any effect at all on their behavior, if only for a while?

When angry constituents took over Congressional town hall meetings in 2009, something began to snap in public life. Candidates received death threats in 2010, and so did sitting members of Congress after they voted on legislation that some people didn't like. Outbursts in classrooms are common now, sometimes from people who are disturbed and sometimes just onery. If a member of Congress can yell "liar" at the President, then why not them?

Yes, we have had violence before--I was a junior in college when JFK was assassinated, and it remains one of the defining moments of my life. I was teaching at a college in Kansas when MLK was assassinated, and remember walking arm and arm down the town's main street with other grieving people of all races, singing "we shall overcome" for two miles while men with rifles stood on rooftops ready to shoot any of us who got "out of line." So this is just the latest chapter, not the beginning, of a sad drama in American life. Like many others, I wonder how the story will end.

I am reminded that one of the rallying cries of the American Revolution was Patrick Henry's "give me liberty, or give me death." Today we hear folks saying in effect, "give me what I want, or it will be your death." And we see people claiming to be a church getting free air time holding up signs rejoicing in the deaths of not only our brave soldiers, but now, the victims this weekend in Arizona.

This is sick. We have gone from using guns for legitimate self defense, Congressionally sanctioned war (as in WW II, in which my father and two of my uncles served), or providing the famiy with food--as my grandfather did when he was between jobs and as my father did as a 12-year-old hunting rabbits for his mother to cook during a time when his father was stranded in town by a blizzard and the rest of the family was out there on the farm--we have gone from these uses to guns and explosives as entertainment. Today I saw at least 3 trailers for upcoming TV series or movies that were full of bullets, blasts, boobs, butts and blood. How can we say that any emotionally or mentally unstable person is going to watch this stuff and not be influenced in some way? Or watch the internet video that made the rounds in early 2010, that showed the Democratic leaders of Congress (Reid, Pelosi, et al) as well as a generic "Liberals" in the crosshairs of a gunsight, and not get the fact that this was meant to be a symbolic target, not a real one? If only one in a million people acts on impulse after watching, listening to, and reading such stuff, is that not one in a million too many?

Anytime there is a tragedy like this, most of us are moved, but don't feel much of a connection with those affected. Sometimes the 6 degrees of separation is much less. My husband learned tonight that the mother of Congresswoman Giffords is one of his high school classmates. We are connected, whether we know it, or not.

Eventually our little Tulsa gang broke up. Gail moved away, Danny died, and I spent more time on roller skates. Then I got interested in astronomy and bird watching, grew up and went to high school and college. But long before we stopped playing, I had put away my cap pistol. I preferred to be the Indian, and I spent many afternoons tied to the clothesline post after being captured. But secretly, I dreamed of reversing the plot of all those old technicolor movies, of being a wise Indian chief and leading my people far away from the conflict, to greener pastures, away from the men with the guns. Of saving my people. I guess I am still dreaming of that role...what can I say, what can I do, to help save my people from this madness of disrespect, frustration, mayhem and self destruction?

For 2011: Let Us Resolve

Heaven knows I have an ambiguous relationship with New Year's resolutions. In recent years I have not made any, because all of those plans to lose 25 pounds, exercise more, write on the blog every day, start garden seeds in March, have all the Christmas presents bought or made by October 30--you know the kind--never come to fruition. Earlier today I posted what I thought were some modest, achievable resolutions on FB but got what amounted to rebukes from a couple of dearest family and friends. They never make resolutions, they said. The compliant me wants to take that as some kind of suggestion that I shouldn't either. But I'm taking a cue from the geraniums that are blooming in the south windows despite the conventional wisdom that they should be hibernating, or even dead. I'm going to make and publish some resolutions anyway. It's one way to try to hold myself accountable.

Last year I made two resolutions: to spend about 1/2 day two days a week working on my family history/memoir project and to spend about 1/2 a day two days a week on quilting projects. I'm the first to note that I didn't make these quotas at least half of the time. However, I did make progress that I had only dreamed about before. The writing project is still gathering steam, but over the year I visited the Special Collections room at the County Library several times in addition to taking genealogy classes there. On our summer vacation I was able to put some of that research to work and I now have field notes and photos from North Carolina. I also have a lot more questions to be chased down in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Alabama, as well as western Oklahoma and west Texas, not to mention southwest Missouri. The quilting projects fared much better if completion was the goal. First, I finished piecing the Linville Family reunion quilt, got it to the Spanish Lake quilters and logged some 75-80 hours working with them between July and December, when it was finished. I still need to add three names to the border and bind it, but it will be ready for the guild quilt show in September 2011. I also joined the scrap quilt club and although the goal was a project a month, I concentrated on finishing two tops and making substantial progress on two more. That is a huge percentage increase in number of projects finished for me! In addition, I completed all 12 of the optional blocks of the month for the guild, something I have never done before in my 20 or so years as a member. So overall, I think having the resolutions kept me going when I was perhaps distracted by other things such as joining Facebook, church volunteering, etc.

So--what's up for 2011?

• Quilting: finish the binding on the reunion quilt. Send the two completed tops from last year to long arm quilters so they will be done! Finish the two tops I have started. Start a brand new project, a baby quilt that I have pattern and fabric for, and work on it at the guild retreat in February. Learn better technique for machine quilting and do a small project of mine.
• Writing: continue research but write a first draft of Emma and Jesse's story to take it out of my head and into a form others can critique for me. Move the stories of Belle, Sarah and Martha into more details from research I have already done. Outline the story of my grandparents and parents and do a better job of preserving original documents.
• Blogging: Do at least one post a month on Compton Rising and on Thursday's Child, instead of letting them lie fallow like I did in 2010. That, or take them down. Blog a minimum of twice a week on Home Stories, and take more photos for the blog as well.
• Technology: stop procrastinating and update my Apple OS so I can use some of the newer versions of Word, Quicken, and Family Tree Maker (it's finally out for Macs...but not those running 10.4) And then gather up the 4 or 5 dead Macs in this house and either donate them if they can be used by anyone or else take them to WITS for recycling.
  
• DeCluttering: last, but not least--more likely foremost. We will have lived in this house 10 years come July, and the amount of stuff in it has almost doubled. My goal is to do at least 10 minutes a day on this. It's insurmountable otherwise. Today I decluttered my Yahoo inbox by unsubscribing from some 7 causes and political sites that I had acquired but am no longer interested in. Then I cleaned out the bathroom medicine cabinet and threw away outdated cosmetics and other mystery substances. I may post every time I toss or recycle some 7 items on my FB page, again, to keep me accountable.

Ultimately, it is all about accountability. In the days before blogs and social media, people like me kept diaries. I have them from age 9 on up through college and early married life, but then I stopped keeping them. For years, on January 1, I would try to start a new chapter in a diary but it would last only a few days. I think that's because a diary has an audience of one. After I became a journalist, and learned about writing for someone else than myself, diaries seemed too self-absorbed. I was also teaching and writing and didn't have time. But every time I log in to FB and see whether anyone has commented on a picture or a status, or sent me a message, or every time I check my SiteMeter stats on my blogs, I know whether or not someone is paying attention to what I say. Often these readers do serve to hold me accountable, just as the FBers today who have no use for resolutions. They forced me to think about why I do still have resolutions, and why I want someone else to know, so I can report my progress (or lack thereof) to someone else besides myself. Because an audience of one is no audience at all.

For Auld Lang Syne: Farewell 2010

Well, it's time to say goodbye to 2010. Some people concen- trate on how bad the "old year" that is leaving has been, but tonight I'm thinking of things I can be thankful for. Last January's snow gave Norm and Ava a chance to show off their bright red knits. I know Norm is thankful for the warm leather jacket. (Recognize it, D?)

We were grateful for the chance to travel a lot this year as well. February and early March found us on the beaches of Ft. Myers and Sanibel, where it was cool, but not snowy. We got to eat out, visit a wildlife preserve and a research farm, play with Sam the poodle and hang out with two of our favorite guys.

The spring was spectacular this year, and just as we enjoyed the flowers we had planted, we also gave thanks for those that were planted by someone before we moved here. Thinking of these daffodils always reminds me to look for ways to leave something beautiful for those who will follow me.

Memorial Day weekend brought fun in the form of the Gypsy Caravan. After two years of staffing a booth for our church in drenching rain, we decided not to have one this year, and guess what, the sun came out! Norm posed with our two main bargains we found: a rolling shopping cart that is lightweight and versatile, and a hand painted bird house. When he went out to take it down after the fall freezes, he found a pile of sticks inside. Maybe next year there will be a real nest!

June found us heading to Colby for the High School Reunion, which always ends with a picnic in Fike Park. This year it was not too warm, not too windy, and people enjoyed lingering. Norm, Don and Walter look serious here, but they soon reverted to their jolly selves.

Maxine and Harold liked the easy chairs. Harold had to take a short trip to the local hospital after this afternoon in the park, but he got well soon and we are glad. Larry didn't come to the picnic but we surprised him with a birthday party at his house the next day. I think he knew something was up.

John and Nan Sanders enjoyed Nan's class party, and we crashed it to say hi. Nan autographed many copies of her first novel, All Stubborned Up, during the weekend. We are so impressed by this achievement, and glad that she is recovering more mobility every day.

We dashed home from Kansas in time to pack and fly to North Carolina. I was so thrilled to get to attend the Quad- rennial assembly, which was held in Greensboro. When 2000 women sing, or dance, or listen intently to a speaker, it sends shivers. Norm was one of about 80 men who also attended.

Elsewhere on the blog I've written about our trip to the Blue Ridge and Linville Falls, as well as to some of the country where our ancestors settled for a generation or so in the late 1700s. We were so thankful to be able to see these places, to walk on these rocks, smell this air, and wonder what it was like for those who came before us. We bought a 500-piece jigsaw puzzle that pictures the falls, and we have been working on it since Christmas night. I think we might have 20% of it done right now. Those gray cliffs look familiar!

The Blue Ridge Highway's Linn Cove viaduct is suspended over some of the more fragile hillsides in this national park. This picture reminds me that we still have roads to travel in 2011, and that with planning and care, Americans can both use the wilderness wisely and preserve it for the future.

As we close out 2010, I also am thankful for FaceBook, although I spend more time there than I spend blogging, I fear. Through the social network revolution, I've been able to catch up with all 15 of the editors of the student newspaper that I advised before I retired, as well as other staff members of that era. These are amazing young people, and I am still proud of them. I also am thankful for finding or being found by college friends (Jan in Maryland, and others) as well as a dear long-lost childhood friend (Ann, now in Dallas.) Many of my high school senior class friends are there too, and we look forward to seeing each other again, 50 years later!, in 2011.

So, as I get ready to pour a small glass of wine (from Kansas, sand plum to be exact) and get out the brass bells of sarna to ring on the front porch, to all my old acquaintances, and friends and family, may you enjoy the happiest of new year's in 2011. Love you!

Did You Have a Good Christmas?

Going all the way back to my childhood, I remember the usual post-Christmas, pre-New Year's greeting: How was your Christmas? Or more likely, Did you have a good Christmas? The question is largely rhetorical, kind of like "hello, how are you?" as the ubiquitous greeting that no one really wants to hear a detailed answer for. The answer to "how are you" is supposed to be "fine." The answer to "did you have a good Christmas" is "oh yes," followed by a litany of fabulous gifts received, goodies consumed and perhaps relatives visited. This week I've been thinking about our Christmas, and how it was this year, and why it seemed so satisfying. For a couple without children or grandchildren, Christmas, at least the gifting part, becomes more about other people, sometimes people we have never met. It also becomes a time of remembrance of cherished family and friends we will not see again.

Every Advent, our church decorates a tree (photo above) in the sanctuary, but its ornaments are scarves, mittens and hats. By Dec. 19 it was loaded, and the next day it was "undecorated" and the warm knit items went downstairs to Isaiah 58 ministries for distribution to their clients. I like to think of a toddler wearing the cute tiny mittens I found, or a man wearing the driving gloves, or a student wearing one of the scarves knitted by a friend in our knitting group. This is one of my favorite holiday trees. Of course my other favorite holiday tree is ours, the one we put together every year, that Norm patiently strings the white lights on, that we carefully put the beaded garlands on before adding the ornaments. This year we didn't go with a theme, but put on the whole collection, from grandma Mc's german glass lanterns to the little sled my dad made to our newest item, a wooly lamb that I bought at Ten Thousand Villages during Quadrennial last summer. It came all the way from Peru! Our Christmas tree is what ties us to past generations and past holidays spent together.

Remember when you were a child and you waiting to see what Santa would bring? I was always impressed that Santa came every year, even if my dad was off to Dallas driving his bus, even though our 800-square foot tiny house lacked a chimney. Mother had a Santa set that she cherished and put out every year. I have it now, along with other Santas I've collected over the years. The little house and the short green trees in this photo are from Mother's set. The train is among the oldest I have that my dad made. Mother always said the red caboose was a car he made especially for her. He made them all by hand, from patterns in Model Railroader: no kits.

Now the 1923 Story and Clark upright that my grandfather Mc bought for mother on her 9th birthday is just the right width to display a length of track, the engine and four cars of Daddy's O-gauge masterpiece. At Christmas a lot of my Santas prefer to travel by train so they get to hang out here for a month or so. Daddy made the little gray house, too. It's a duplex, and there is a separate outhouse out back. If anyone cares, the doors do open and it's a two-holer. The sleigh from mother's Santa set was made by Daddy, too. And mother's reindeer, which are hollow and seem to be made out of some kind of hollow plastic, date from the late 1930s or early 1940s. Just like the Christmas ornaments, and the nativity sets, the Santa scene recalls those many good Christmases of childhood as well as those of my and Norm's years together.

No they aren't real. These are the porch poinsettias so they have to be of fabric to withstand our cold Missouri nights. These greet the mail carrier every day as they are just above our mailbox on a post.

I have the feeling that often "good Christmas" is a code for "did you get a lot of presents" or "did you get the presents you wanted." This year we decided not to get presents, but to give them. It feels good to know that someone in St. Louis has warm hands and head, that someone in Florida will get tutored in literacy, that a woman in a developing country will get sewing supplies or even a microloan, that children at a day care center in St. Louis that serves low income families will have new equipment to replace what was lost in a November flood, that an elderly person living in a retirement home in Tulsa will receive compassionate care, that some third-graders in a city school will get a new book for Christmas. These were our gifts to each other and others this year, and it was a very good Christmas indeed. We hope you received meaningful gifts, the gifts that you wanted, and we also hope that you had an opportunity to give good gifts-- perhaps the gift of yourself, your love or your presence to someone this Christmas. At our house we observe 12 days of Christmas, so we will be celebrating all the way to January 6, maybe longer. Feliz Navidad, Joyeux Noel, ho ho ho Merry Christmas!