We've come to the end of the daylight hours for Tuesday

Well...nearly.

I spent a good portion of the day doing the things for Gram that needed doing, and alternating those with work on the quilt. I have gotten as far with it here as I can...I need some of the more muslin pieces to finish the last 3 open half-squares (I originally planned to use some really pretty light print, just to add a little zing in three areas, but changed my mind after the assembling began), and I am having a tough time with color choices for the last two open elongated hexes.

If I hadn't been so quick in the beginning to sew the blocks together (into rows) I maybe could have rearranged the constructed squares to my liking (100%) and not been laboring over the color placement now. With 85% of the blocks already assembled into rows, I can do nothing about major changes now. [Sigh]

At any rate, the daylight has gone, and pinning and stitching are done for the day, and since tomorrow I return home, I decided to put away the machine, my work table, the ironing board, etc., and spend any extra time writing. No sense in getting involved with stitching when I won't have time enough to finish (and without the necessary materials, I am at loose ends anyhow).

I have a significant amount of leftover cut pieces that I have decided I will turn into a pinwheel border. Once I stitch them together in 2-sets, I will then press them open and cut each new square in half across the bias. The only pattern I will follow for chain-stitch-assembling these small blocks will be to have a dark and a light fabric, in order to keep the pinwheel construction a breeze.

I wish I could post a photo or two to show you where I am with the whole thing, but I have exhausted all of my card readers and thumb drives I have trying to upload on this Mac, with no success. So you will just have to wait another day or two before seeing progress. I think you will be quite pleased with the results when you see them.

Have a great evening, and try to get outside tomorrow to enjoy the sunshine and warming temps! After all, there is a whole new set of daylight hours headed our way in less than ten hours!!

Happy Birthday, Nathan Fillion!

I am going to look like such a dweeb all over again, but 'boy friends' must be wished a happy birthday when their special day arrives.

Mmmmm....Canadian meat!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, you lovely Canadian! Hope you had a shiney day!

With love and admiration,

Bill Pardy

(I know I used it before, but it bore repeating)

On the road, again

I will be on the road shortly, now I'm just tending to last minute things.

Last night, I spent the evening watching a good movie with a good friend and my son, and then feeling bad (because of the movie), until we switched channels to watch the end of the MSU/Iowa game - that was a definite mood enhancer!

Hooray for the mighty Spartans!! They are still on the road, too...they've migrated from the sweet sixteen to the next bracket...on their way to the final four!

Bob Hope and Bing Crosby would be so proud.

Yup, I did it again

I am just getting back inside from the garage. Yes, I spent nearly the ENTIRE doggone day out there, except for the early morning hours. I did take a short break in the mid-afternoon to grab something to eat and wait for Brian to return home with more 2" screws to finish putting up the shelves, but I got right back to it again.

I became engrossed with the whole cleaning process too, and managed to boot some more junk to the curb and move stuff around. Even moved a large, heavy shelving unit from the NW (front) corner of the garage to the back (SE) corner (with help from Brian). That was some mean feat, let me tell you. There wasn't much room to manuever, but we did it!

I hooked up a spare stereo and mounted it high up on the wall, so I can now listen to tunes whether I am on the patio, in the front or rear flowerbeds, on the deck or in the backyard pruning the privet hedge - so I am set to make the most out of being outside this spring/summer/fall.

I still have a long way to go before we can even think about pulling a car into the garage, but I am excited to have progress and to be able to see some changes! Wahoo!

Sadly, I will not be able to touch it again until next week, but by then it will [hopefully] be warmer, which will make the work go faster.

Safe to say, I believe I will be sleeping quite well tonight. Tomorrow I will spend some time packing and finishing needful things before my LOA begins this weekend. I want to make certain I have everything I need for working on the quilt, so that I can have the top completed by the time I return. Next week I will be able to stretch and pin baste it, and then begin the quilting!

Change is good (for the most part).

Wet newspaper

Oh, those wacky cats.

It must have been between 5 and 5:30 this morning when the girls decided to play.

Flop will egg on Cleo (sometimes with a purpose, other times completely unintentionally), and Cleo will comply about sixty to seventy percent of the time. Usually, the play will be brief - for all of the energy expended to start something - but if you are lucky enough to be witness to it, the play is entertaining.

And I must admit, there are times when we humans of the domicile see the inkling of silliness and cat mayhem beginning, and we will endeavor to raise the stakes quickly before one of them loses interest. It makes it enjoyable to for us...is that so wrong?

At any rate, typically, Flop will forget she wanted to play and become bored - or focused on some other activity - but Cleo will still be game. What's a dog-cat with an extremely sticky attention span supposed to do?

This morning was one of those events, where somehow, in the dark, play was initiated but then became a nuisance. Undeterred, Cleo pursued Flop until Flop was overcome by one of her famous hissy fits. She protests Cleo's attempts at play by hissing and slapping (with large, ineffectual cotton ball feet), which Cleo ignores and pushes past, nipping and taunting until Flop dissolves into a hunchbacked trundle run to any piece of furniture she can get under (which, amazingly enough is almost every piece of upholstered furniture we own). From that protected vantage point, Flop continues her protesting and defensive slap tactics with very little success.

Cleo, on the other hand, lays on the floor inches away, rolling and stretching like a kitten, prutting and purring and basically looking as innocent and cute as can be, while her sister is then overcome by gag reflex and starts to cough up a hairball, induced by the hissing of the play time.

This morning was one of those hissy fit catastrophes, and while I soothed Flop into a calmer state (preventing the hairball mess), I was jolted into a new day. I thought I could go back to bed and have the warmth of flannel sheets and toasty blankets, and the quiet darkness of the predawn hours, lull me back to sleep.

Nope. No such luck. I lay there for about an hour or so when I finally realized I was waisting awake time...so up and at 'em.

Rats!

It's raining...and very quietly, I must add. Usually I can hear the rain, or at least smell it, but not this morning. I turned on the TV to find out what time I had managed to lolly-gag to, and was told by the cheery weather dude that it was raining at 6:34, but that we might see sunshine before the sun sets today. Humph!

While I was soothing Flop earlier, I saw the flashing strobe of the paper delivery car bounce around the living room walls upstairs. So my paper was at the end of the driveway, hopefully not drenched or lying in a puddle (my delivery person has a knack for soaking a paper), but definitely in jeopardy of succumbing to the elements.

I fed the girls, then donned shoes and a sweater and sloshed out to the street.

Yup, squishy paper.

Double rats!

6:55 A.M. - Mr. Robin has decided it is time to wake the rest of the bird neighborhood. I like the sound of early birds just before and during twilight.

7:04 A.M. - A lighter sky has penetrated the cloud coverage, and you can detect daylight is on its way.

7:26 A.M. - Sure, the newspaper is still too wet to read, but I am towelled off and inside, and my day has promise. I am turning my page.

See you in the funny papers!

Moving right along

Please remember, all quilt blogging and photos now posting at: www.truenorthquilter.blogspot.com

Simply, another photo of the baby quilt.

I won't have time to work on it at all in the next twenty-four hours, I have made plans to get something else done and to run a few errands, but here it is, as is, for the time being.

The patches go together very quickly, so the assembly should be a snap - aside from the matching of the points on all of those triangles - ay carumba! There are two main block components for an Ocean Waves; a series of four by four rows of triangles, containing 32 pieces, and the large center square on point, with triangle corners (these blocks consist of 17 pieces each). It can add up to an awful lot of triangles, squares, half squares and quarter squares cut and pieced by the time it is all together. The piecing has to be tight and consistant, and the seaming and pressing must be done without stretching the bias cut side of the pieces, or else, you can have one rippled quilt top when it comes time to quilt.

More later. Have a colorful day!

March divided by 7 days/wk = the 21st

Please remember, all quilt blogging and photos now posting at: www.truenorthquilter.blogspot.com

In other words, it's 3/21. I just thought it was a mathematically neat coincidence when I saw the date, that's all.

Oh, and yes, I've been working on the baby quilt, and I've managed to add new materials to the fray. Crazy, I know, especially given the palette I began with...but I can now say - without fear of reprisal or noisy guffaws - it is a good thing I have a decently sized collection of material to work with at my fingertips. I haven't had to go back to the store yet to buy something "just right" to fill in a hole (although, I wish I had more taupe colored yardage to choose from).

Ah well. [heavy sigh]

On the brighter side: it looks as though the pieced squares may be larger (when finished) than I thought, in comparison to the overall Ocean Waves pattern, so I may not have to make as many pieced blocks as I thought I would in order to complete the top. This could be a good thing, or I could be regretting the scale of my cut work in a short while.

It was suggested that I make a twin size quilt instead of a baby quilt, but I am not sold on that idea, as it would require more quilting overall to finish it, and I am on a tight time table. I do know that over time it would mean the quilt would see more use if it were larger, but I am going to have to get closer to having the thing pieced (as is) before I make up my mind one way or the other.

Here's a photo of the work so far, not too bad (if I do say so myself). ;^)

Spring has sprung

The long, pre-spring warm snap ended today - oddly enough on the first day of spring. Mother Nature is one odd duck, don't ya know. But that's alright, we are still head and shoulders in much better condition than much of the United States, and have been for a good many of the last several months.

Not a bad winter, and it ended early, so who could complain? I mean really...who?

You! In the back row [smart Alec]...put your hand down! There will be no complaining about the weather. Jeez. Seriously?!?

I intended to work out in the garage today, but opted to stay indoors and put some time in on the baby quilt instead...all the while thinking of the garage and next steps to take. I would like to be able to use it for parking, for storage, for...well, something more than an obstacle course, and I made a pretty good scratch in the surface while looking for the punch bowl and while finding tools to begin Karl's bedroom work, but it has been a couple of weeks since all of that, and I have yet to get back out there to put more cleaning time in. I would love to keep gaining ground in the garage, hopefully clear a bunch of floor space and get things moved or tossed out by summer, but I don't know when it's going to happen.

Maybe if I commit a few hours each day to that chore, a few hours outdoors to clean out the flowerbeds (a little at a time), and spend the evening hours happily quilting, maybe I would shake this guilty feeling of not doing enough of the right stuff every day.

I don't know which would be better - starting and ending ONE task before moving on to a whole other thing that needs doing, or continue on the way that I have been; tackling a few things a little at a time so I can get through a day without feeling as though I accomplished nothing whatsoever.

I am stymied. Seriously perplexed.

And all of this has nothing to do with spring cleaning, really. I have been semi-power-cleaning for months, now, you just can't tell without a score card [and before and after photos].

If anyone has any good ideas they can throw my way, I would be grateful to read them. What would you do? How would you handle a long to-do list where everything seems equally important to get done? If you've been reading, you know this is not the first time I have aired this personal dilemma.

That baby quilt update

Home from Livonia and I can now load the first photos of the new quilt project. For some reason the lovely old Mac at Gram's can't read my external hard drive, and the one thumb drive I had in my purse is also too big for the Mac's capabilities, so I have to wait until I can get online with compatible equipment to upload pictures.

Isn't technology a nightmare?

Anyhow, these aren't anything more than the beginnings of the project - color selection, material palette, cut pieces and the like, but at least you can see the progression. It took three solid days of daylight hours to get this far, after sketching out (then discarding) the original sampler block idea, and then deciding upon an Ocean Waves design instead.

I would like to finish this little thing before/in time for 'boy Schaffer's' arrival, but it's more likely I'll have it completed shortly thereafter. Time will tell. Laura (and Scott) decided on a cute sheet set called JJ Coles "Blue Bullseye" for the baby's room, and the paint scheme is of the same palette, so I figured to follow suit. It's a striped motif, and the colors are clear, but on a more grown-up level. Chocolate brown, baby blue, khaki, (a small amount of) olive green, a clear orange, tan or taupe and the creamy muslin all together - not a bad palette to work with, but it did become quite clear to me that incorporating all of them into various small scale blocks wasn't going to be as quickly accomplished as I thought in the beginning. While cutting the strips I realized I had to change the overall quilt to an Ocean Waves pattern, instead. Above: "Boy's Nonsense" using a four of the materials selected from the stash for the baby quilt.

This was to be one of many different blocks in the overall quilt top, but to get the sampler result I wanted was going to take too many "me" hours (I am too much a perfectionist), and a scrappy look for me is still way too planned.

This assortment is approximately 750 triangles, and I am certain it will take another few hundred to finish the top. I also still need to cut 18 squares and many half squares (on the diagonal), to finish the alternate blocks of the overall pattern. Note: Oranges are hard to work into anything, and as you can see, I have three different solid oranges besides the three prints.

More on this as I have some progress. Thanks for looking in!

12:01 a.m.

Just chatted with Brian on FB, and he has good news about the job with the comic book publisher in Detroit.

FINALLY, f i n a l l y, after two months he has the nod, and has signed a contract for two books with them!

The pay is pretty good for a newbie, and he will be drawing and inking for the most part - unless they ask/require him to also color pages...then the pay per page goes up! If he submits colored work - beyond the scope of the requested work - then they can either use it or not, and if it is used, they adjust the pay for those pages. If they ask him to do covers, there is yet another bump.

Needless to say he is excited, and he has his head down, and is making hay while the sun shines. They (those publication people) seem to be as fickle and unreliable a bunch as production folks.

Oh, those artsy-fartsy types!

Still, he is happy, and as long as he makes the deadlines for each book, once the current contract ends, he is expecting to be able and negotiate a better rate the next time. Yea!

P.S. Happy St. Patrick's Day, y'all!

I have reconsidered

I now think I will do a simple (yes, "simple") Ocean Waves pattern for the baby quilt.

I already have so much time into the block planning and schematics, but I think the overall effect (with the color scheme) will be a lot more effective/attractive with an overall pattern instead of the sample quilt I was planning.

I can still use the strips I cut today for the pieces, I just need to come up with a size for the blocks. Not too small, but definitely not on the larger side, either. It is a baby quilt after all, and Ocean Wave quilts are a LOT of piecing, and if made too large, it can look totally wrong and awkward.

I cut out one set of sample pieces for the first of 18 pieced blocks (for the sampler quilt), and just decided the hassle of making another seventeen was going to drive me loony. Tomorrow, I will upload photos of the material/color selection and of the first block - the one that started the whole reconsideration process.

So, until the then, have a great night and enjoy this fabulous sleeping weather.

Another day, another....day

That's about it.

I found a post I hadn't finished from a few days back, so I finished and posted it a short while ago - I hope you enjoy it. Shoot...for that matter I hope you can follow it.

Every once in a while I begin a thought and get a few lines 'on paper', but then get interrupted. (This is where the boys - or Jean - would insert "squirrel.") Sometimes it is a momentary intrusion and I can sit back down and pick up where I left off without a problem; other times there is a much longer delay in getting back to writing. On those occasions where it takes longer to get back to finishing an entry, the intent of my blog sometimes gets away from me and I end up scrapping the entry altogether rather than finishing it.

Let's face it, if the point you try to make has a real explicit purpose and you get off track, sometimes there is no picking up the scent again once the reasoning is lost.

I know, I know...too many mixed metaphors. See what I mean about losing your train of thought.

Squirrel!

Knee-jerk reactions

It's funny, isn't it, how our point of view changes over the years. We think of things (sometimes fondly, other times not so much) and remember them differently. Or, we think of our reactions to events and conversations with people, and how we would have done or said something differently had we only had (or taken) another 5 seconds before opening our mouths and reacting.

Regretful.

We humans are a regretful lot, and anyone who walks around saying they never regret anything they've done or said (or didn't do or say) is either lying or heartless (or full of excrement).

I am not certain living 'in the moment' is any better as a way to travel through life, but everything in today's society is so fast-paced and keeps us out of touch with really having to deal with people face-to-face and one-on-one for the most part, unless we put ourselves in to those predicaments.

Getting a meal and banking via the drive-thru, shopping online, texting and email, cable TV, on demand movies and sports, and on and on, all require little to no interpersonal contact. It's no wonder we don't know how to socialize appropriately any more.

The middle finger salute is now the normal response to a perceived slight of any sort, as are totally foul language and insults of all types, instead of simply letting go and taking a deep breath or pointing out the issue in a more calm, reasonable way.

Reactions are out of proportion and most times inappropriate to the initial slight. What has happened to society? Where have decent behavior and morality gotten to? Why can't those who initially behave badly simply say "excuse me" or "I'm sorry" instead of becoming incredibly defensive and thinking they were in the right? And why can't those who suffer the actions of boorish, stupid, irrational people put it into perspective before allowing something momentarily annoying from ruining their day and becoming a 'snowball' for themselves and all around them?

Knee-jerk reaction?

Happy Spring!

That's it. Simple and green and wahoo!

PS - Don't forget to set your clocks ahead tonight.

Nothing much to say

Except, maybe, "good night."

I spent the week torn between different projects and events and happenings, trying to make the best use of my time before heading away from my stash for a bit. Same old same old, ya know?...tried to do too many things and never really finished any one thing.

Old habits die hard.

I brought with me the material palette I will be using for that baby quilt I spoke about last blog, and my plan is to hunker down and graph out the blocks I've decided on for the project, and I hope to cut out several of the squares for it while I am on duty this week. I decided not to bring the machine along, so if I manage to get the graphing and the cutting done (by some strange, fantastical quirk of nature), I will be forced to work on a script the rest of my stay in G-land instead of sewing 100% of the time.

I will take/load a photo of the color/fabric selection tomorrow when I have some brilliant daylight at my disposal. Trust me when I say I think I made some good choices for the material while using a terribly small sample from an online source as a reference. This sample quilt might turn out ok.

For now, however, I am maxed out and ready for shut-eye. See you on the flip side.

I know what I said...but I have to make an exception

Yes, I have to make an exception to an earlier statement. I have a quick [NEW] quilting mission to handle before I carry on with those older quilting projects I dug out and committed myself to earlier in the new year.

"Why?" you ask. (Well, maybe you aren't asking that, but here's the reason.) I decided to make a simple baby quilt for the latest expected wee one in the family. It's a baby quilt, so decidely not a big thing. I thought I should be able to get it done relatively quickly and move on, but I am hung up on the design aspects. That isn't normally a problem for me.

I took center squares and permanent markers with me to the baby shower for relatives to sign; my intent was to incorporate the signed blocks into larger patches so the new family has a memory quilt for the little fella, but that sort of backfired in ways I hadn't anticipated. I may end up using the lovely patches on the backing instead of on the front. IT REMAINS TO BE SEEN, though, and I hope I don't have to go to that extreme, but if it comes to pass then I am ready for that work around.

See, some folks signed more than one each, and others got away before I though to bring the squares out to sign. Some people wrote a sentiment, but never signed their square...and still others couldn't commit to anything at all, therefore deciding to take the blank square home with them, promising to mail it back in short order.

Ah well. Poor execution on my part led to a great lesson (for me), and some things I will most certainly keep in mind should I (ever) try this again.

I have a color palette to work with as my cousins chose a specific sheet set for the child's bedding, and that is always a groovy thing. That hurdle (color selection) is sometimes the toughest to get over, so now all I need do is settle on the design, but I am making that easy on myself, too. I've chosen 4 or 5 block patterns I can easily make smaller and then alternate with blank blocks to fill the top of a baby quilt. With a smaller number of blocks to cut and piece, and the addition of plain blocks in between, the construction will be a snap. Quilting a smaller project will also take less time, so I might be able to make it before the arrival of the little critter (or at the very least, I can be delivering the quilt shortly after lil boy Schaffer makes it home).

We'll see, and I will keep you posted.

Monday, Monday...can't trust that day

Isn't it funny how some days you can wake up with a song in your head? I don't know where it comes from, but today, my song is a Mama's and Papa's tune from the sixties

"Monday mornin', you gave me no warnin' of what was to be...."

I called the house to be certain the boys were up and around - Karl has his second week of 'Soft Skills' work in Oak Park, and the transport driver will arrive as scheduled whether I am there or not, and today is Brian's day to be mother hen and get his little brother moving.

I was glad to find Bud had stepped up, even though I had not reminded either of them the night before about the deadlines and such...but I was most worried about Karl not having breakfast and not having provisions for lunch - whether he opted to visit his favorite deli or take something with, but they seem to have it under control....so today, I have to let go and believe/trust/have faith.

"...sometimes, it just turns out that way..."

What song is playing in your head today? Hope it's a good one, everybody.

An early morning return email to mom

Howdy and good morning!

Had a busy day yesterday, and I FOUND ONE PUNCH BOWL! I stopped looking after that find and figured it would have to do.

Am packing just now, and I am running it all over in my head so I don't forget anything. For such a short stay, there is still too much crap going into that car!

Ugh!

To make matters worse, I keep getting up earlier and earlier - always ahead of the alarm. This morning, when I found I could not sleep any longer, I got up and looked at the time. 5:42A.M. @!&!#$!?*@**!*#

I hopped back in bed hoping to snooze a little longer...but I couldn't, so I just got up.

The girls caught on about 20 minutes later, and Cleo came down to remind me she might be hungry. She does like to cuddle, too, and we spent about 10 minutes just watching the sky go from tones of dark blue and purple to burnt, rich orange and beautiful robin's egg blue - from the bottom up. She lay across my arms as we stood at the door, and by the time I put her down, my arm was moist from the happy drool and she was purring loudly.

Now to get busy. Brian and I will be on the road around 11 or so, aiming to get to Livonia around noon.

Love you,

me

Sidetracked - AGAIN!

I went into the garage to dig out the punch bowls for this weekend's baby shower, and wouldn't you know I couldn't find either one! Not a sign of either!

I unpacked and looked into almost every box - there were those I could be fairly safe not opening, as I had notes taped to the outside of the box stating the contents. But I am not so certain I trust my own notes any more.

Well, I was frustrated beyond words. Beyond noises. Beyond grunting and slow burning. I was miffed...and befuddled.

How do you misplace two punch bowls? Two!?

Yeah, I don't know either, and they're my punch bowls.

I did find two boxes of photos, though. Precious pictures of my boys, and some of my extended family...but photos I had given up on - thinking maybe the ex glommed them, as he did so many other of my personal items, or thinking maybe I just didn't take the pictures I could so clearly remember having seen in years past. You know how that goes, right?

Well, I put those lovely treasures in the house and kept busy with the task in hand. Later, when I went inside to warm up and get a drink, I opened a packet of pictures and quickly glanced through them. Smiles and warm memories.

I was hooked. Pretty soon I had looked through six or seven packets and a large handful of loose photos I thought I had lost forever.

Every once in a while I would tell myself I needed to get back out to the garage and run another search, from top to bottom. Naw, it's cold and getting dark I reasoned. Tomorrow would afford me another chance to look, and I would get to it as soon as K left the house. Start laundry, move things about and search the boxes again - only THIS time opening and unpacking each one until I am absolutley sure the box does not contain a punch bowl.

Anyhow, I went back out into the garage this morning, and once more into the afternoon...and I found one! Hooray!

I will settle for one, right now (I have to). I can fake my way through with the other one, but mark my words. I will be back, and I will find that missing bowl.

You can't hide from me forever, bowlie bowl.

Up with the sun, gone with the wind...

What a week! This is why I need time in between stints away from home.

I just get rolling on a project, or get heavily into it, then I have to put on the brakes. The stuff I am doing right now isn't portable work, so I end up having to put things away - or aside - and then we all end up living around the debris (the boys and the cats and myself). It's been like this for a while; it's sort of like living on sand dunes! The debris just keeps shifting in size and locations, with no real resolution. [smacking forehead] That is, until recently.

Sometimes it's easy enough to pick up where I left off with some activities, but other times, once the momentum is lost, it is hard to get it rolling again. There are so many other events and projects needing my attention, staring me in the face and screaming for blocks of my time.

I'm thinking about just screaming back.

This week Karl has been attending a "Soft Skills" 'training', and I have had the alarm set every day so that I could be up and ready ahead of him - getting his lunch and breakfast made before he has to be out of bed. Oddly, I haven't needed the alarm at all - I've awakened every day, on my own, AHEAD of the silly alarm!

He's been pretty good about the whole thing, only being a little stubborn yesterday about getting up. And he only balked twice upon coming home and finding the floor in his room and a clear path to the bed and desk!

Next week we will repeat the whole up-and-at-'em routine, and I will attempt to make the best use of his absence to work in his bedroom again, spackling, sanding, cleaning and maybe painting. We'll see. I was happy enough just to get it cleaned out and begin the process...so hopefully finishing won't be out of the question....at least by the end of the month.

Until then, I'll keep you posted. I just have to keep concentrating on one thing at a time. The garage (the lower level floor, the bathroom repairs, etc.) will just have to take a back seat for the time being.

March

In like a monkey...out like a bad banana!

Yesterday was sort of worthwhile

Karl was picked up (late) by a driver to get down to Oak Park for his first day of this New Horizons "Soft Skills" [training] thing. It's been a long time in coming - something effective, proactive, promised from this damn state agency, and I am at wits end. But the newest case worker (in a long line of MRS people to touch his file) is a little more on the ball than the rest, so MAYBE there's hope for a little while. 'bout the time we get used to her, she will move on, too.

Although, she only has access to whatever she can find and get approved by her supervisor to help Karl, and there are as many scam artists and sham businesses out there for persons with special needs as there are programs for training for the unemployed lately - willing to take training dollars from the state for faux work training and not really produce a whole lot of results.

In his absence, I went to work on Karl's room, cleaning and packing and getting ready to spackle and sand and then paint in order to FINISH another PROJECT and cross it off of my longstanding to-do list.

He returned home well after four o'clock, and he wasn't happy when he rounded the corner and saw empty shelves and 3 boxes lined up, and bare surface area on his floor and on the desk. Today will probably make him less pleased, but there's no turning back. I need to get this done.

Of course, it all would have gone faster yesterday had Cleo not been sick and suffering another blockage. There was a lot of lost time following the poor girl and cleaning up after her until the 'cork finally popped' (so to speak). Today, she has an appetite and is her twinkly, chirpy, stretchy little self again, but I will continue to watch and listen for her throughout the day...just in case. Today will consist of moving furniture, taking things out to the garage, vacuuming 'til the sucker busts and general prep work. Tomorrow, I will be up on a ladder, and then the real fun begins!

Wish me luck and think good thoughts. I am afraid of whatever may be lurking under things and in those corners! ;^)

In like a lamb, out like a lion?

Any opinions, anyone? Suggestions? Arguments? Differentials? Anecdotes?

You've heard that old expression haven't you? "In like a lion, out like a lamb." That's in reference to March; but has anyone ever heard any other little ditties about the remaining eleven months? I never have.

(And yes, I know I reversed it in the title...hello!! It is day one of March. It's sunny and mild, and the whole week has already been prognosticated as becoming beautifully warmer with each passing day. Yeah, 40* on Sunday? "LAMB!" Definitely.)

Let's see if we can come up with something for each of the others, shall we.

January - In like a drunk, out like you threw up on the sofa.

February - In like a mess and out like a spilled container of curdled milk in the back of your fridge. (The mess is starting to look pretty good, isn't it?)

Well, you get the idea...but I am certain you can be a lot more creative. I challenge you to come up with something for January through December, otherwise....I am going to have to do it on my own. Do you really want that?