“It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas everywhere you go”…….screeeeeeeeech…………..whoa, wait! Christmas is officially 57 days away. We haven’t even celebrated Thanksgiving yet! Back up the truck (or the calendar pages), we haven’t even hit the month of November.
But the scene which greeted me outside my house this morning enticed me to sing Christmas carols. That’s because it is snowing here at Mama’s Empty Nest! A pristine white overlay cloaks the still green grass in our yard, not a usual occurrence for October here in my area of the state. About an inch or so already accumulates on the maple trees that haven’t dropped their coats of pretty fall colors yet. It’s an odd sight.
The weather forecasters predicted this, but I scoffed when I heard their report. I expected maybe some snowy bits mixed in with rain, but not this.
Not the ground covered with a fluffy white blanket, the outside world wrapped in colorless cotton, and a steady dusting of Suzy Snowflake and all of her friends continuing to descend.
My house looks as if it’s ensconced in an unremitting snow globe, one where the snow never stops and settles.
I’m posting pictures. I know it isn’t Wordless Wednesday, but for me on this 29th page in Chapter 10 of my Opportunity book, I am shocked. Let’s just call this Speechless Saturday.
Oh well… “Oh the weather outside is frightful, but the fire is so delightful and since we’ve no place to go, let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!”
Back in the day before kids wrote spitefully mean things about one another on Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking media, they actually wrote pleasant words in something called an autograph book.
Instead of ‘sexting’ obscene photos to each other, they would draw funny, harmless illustrations, with an actual writing instrument like a pencil or pen, in your autograph book for you to remember them by.
Autograph books became passé eventually. But if you’re of a certain era, you’ll remember those small hardbound books and you might even have one stashed away in a box of school mementos like I do. I actually own three of these little gems from my elementary and junior high school days.
All this simple fad required was taking your book to school with you and asking your classmates to sign it. Mine had different pastel colored pages, and I still remember the girl who wrote, “Just because I’m writing on pink doesn’t mean that I stink.” I never thought she was stinky, so I always wondered why she wrote that particular ditty.
Friends penned funny lines in my book like “Yours till the ocean wears rubber pants to keep its bottom dry” and “I love you, I love you, I love you divine. Please give me your bubblegum, you are sitting on mine!” One silly friend wrote, “I went to your funeral. The preacher did say, This is the shell, the nut has passed away.”
Some entries proved sweet and sentimental like “In the golden chain of friendship, consider me a link” and “In the ocean of friends, count me as a permanent wave.” As a young girl, I always hoped some handsome young man would write something endearing in my book and my wish came true with this one: “Roses are red, violets are blue. Sugar is sweet, but I love you.”
On one special page, my elderly grandfather signed his name. Nothing more. Just his name. But I treasure that signature since both of my maternal grandparents died six months apart from one another when I was nine.
My mother purchased all three autograph books for me and I realize now that she must have wanted me to cherish memories of my school years just as she did. When my parents passed away and my sisters and I were clearing out all those years of accumulation at our folks’ house, we found our mother’s autograph book from school days dated 1929 to 1934.
The rhyming lines written in my mother’s book are clever and poetic. I suspect children today don’t memorize poetry very much like those youngsters of yesteryear. I’d like to share some of the sentiments from my mother’s autograph book and a simpler day and age with you along with my thoughts in parenthesis.
“Remember me well, remember me sick. And when you buy candy, remember me quick. Your friend, Hazel” (Hopefully, Hazel wasn’t just my mother’s friend when she had candy.)
“Roses are red, pumpkins are yellow. You’re the girl that stole my fellow. Your friend, Margaret” (Well, at least Margaret was still her friend!)
“When hills and vales divide us and you no more I see, pick up your pen and paper and write a line to me. Your friend, June” (Friends whether they were near or far.)
“Far out on the ocean carved on a rock are these three words, forget me not. A friend, Eleanora” (Isn’t that a sweet thought?)
“Remember me and bear in mind, a good true friend is hard to find. But when you find one good and true, change not the old one for the new. Your classmate, Marie” (Marie understood friendship well.)
“When you get old and ugly as people often do, remember that you have a friend that’s old and ugly too. Your friend, Esther Olive” (This dear lady is still alive at age 92, elderly but she’s certainly not ugly!)
“A wish for a friend is often given, but my wish for you is a home in heaven. Your dear friend, Mildred Marie” (Since Mildred Marie cared about my mom’s spiritual life, she was a dear friend.)
“When you get old and are mending britches, think of me between the stitches. Your friend, Carrie Belle” (This dear lady sewed a lot of stitches right beside my mother over the years.)
“I dipped my pen into the ink and grasped the album tight, but for my life I could not think a single thing to write. H.R.” (This gentleman was my mother’s cousin – a man of few words but a kind soul.)
My uncle wrote this one in my mother’s book: “Germany is a country but Texas is a state. I can see it on your face when you have a date.” (Since the word date was underlined, I think he suspected a romance was in the works for my mother and his brother, my father, don’t you?)
This entry tickles me pink. “Remember me and don’t forget you have a friend in [our town]. Pickles are sour, sugar is sweet. Candy is sticky and the [our town] girls are very tricky.” (I laugh out loud when I read this one, not just because the verse is silly, but because of the writer’s initials signed at the bottom of the page. Those initials belonged to my father.)
Out of all the clever, corny, or cherished verses written in my mother’s autograph album, I really like this one:
“When your walk on earth is ended and your paths no more I trod, may your name in gold be written in the autograph of God. Your cousin, Mabel” (I am thankful both my parents’ names are written in the Book of Life.)
My favorite entry though is one written and dated January 8, 1963 in one of my autograph books. It reads: “Dear Daughter, I wish I were a tea cup from which you drank your tea, and every time you’d take a sip, you’d think of your mommie. Lots of love, Mum.”
On this chilly day, Chapter 10, Page 27 in my book of Opportunity, I sip steaming, hot tea from my lovely tea cup given to me by one of my own dear daughters as I write these words. I think of my mother, her life, and all the things she taught me like cherishing memories from an old, faded autograph book. I think she taught me well and I pray I’ve taught my own daughters the same.
When I was a kid, Sundays were special in a simple way.
Sunday was a day of worship first, then rest, with maybe a smattering of visiting friends and relatives on the side.
Businesses were closed except for a few restaurants where you could enjoy Sunday dinner. If you needed milk, you better have run to the store Saturday because you wouldn’t be able to purchase groceries on Sunday.
My family always attended church Sunday mornings and commenced the day by worshiping God, the Creator of our days. After church, my mother either cooked a big dinner, or if it was just Mom, Dad and me, we’d venture to a restaurant for our Sunday meal.
If we stayed home that afternoon, often times my mother would take a well-needed nap and my dad might watch a little television or listen to the baseball game on the radio. I usually curled up somewhere cozy with a book to read. It truly was a day of rest in preparation for the week of busyness to come.
Often times after lunch, visitors would stop by our house. Sometimes they were relatives, sometimes friends and –gasp! –the adults would just sit around the living room talking to one another. The television stayed turned off; there were no electronic gadgets to distract from the conversation. They talked. They shared memories. They caught up with one another’s lives and activities. They remembered and shared funny stories or sad ones. And they truly enjoyed each other’s company.
If we didn’t go visiting, Dad might take us for a Sunday afternoon drive. We would ramble here and there taking in sights, enjoying the sunshine, the fall leaves, the snow glistening on the trees, whatever scenery unfolded in front of us. Our car wasn’t equipped with CD or DVD players, no one had an ipod attached to their ears or a cell phone demanding answers to texts and calls. We either listened to soothing music on the radio, we talked, or we just rode in silence absorbed in our own thoughts.
Often we stopped by someone’s house for a Sunday afternoon visit. The same thing that happened at our house occurred at our friends’ or relatives’ homes as well – the adults chatted the afternoon away while the children played or joined in the conversation.
From all those simple Sundays, I learned many things. I learned that worshiping God came first. I learned that it’s important to spend uninterrupted time with loved ones. I learned that children can acquire a lot of knowledge from their elders. I learned to savor quiet time and rest one day a week. And I learned to be patient.
I miss those days. My husband and I were just discussing this recently. We grow weary during the week and we look forward to simple Sundays. Neither of us works in a profession that requires us to work on that day, so we can do whatever we like.
For us, Sunday morning worship comes first. Then we may rest here in the empty nest. Hubby reads the paper, watches a football game on television, or reads. You can usually find me lounging in my easy chair reading or working a crossword puzzle. Occasionally, we might go for a drive in the surrounding countryside.
This past Sunday we did just that. After church, we ate lunch at a local restaurant followed by a leisurely Sunday drive to a nearby community where some Amish folks live. The day proved lovely with warm sunshine, colors of fall leaves greeting us, and not just a change of scenery, but a change of pace. As we drove along, Amish buggies pulled by trotting horses shared the road with us.
Observing them reminded me of their simple lifestyle and what their Sundays must be like. For the Amish, the Sabbath is a day to worship God and rest, and no doubt, visit friends and neighbors afterwards.
I imagine those buggies full of families tucked inside were on their way to either church or social gatherings.
We noticed children playing in the cornfields while I suspect their elders enjoyed conversations or some well-deserved rest inside their farmhouses.
In that respect I envy them.
It makes me sad that no one stops by our house for a Sunday visit. I suspect if we dropped in at friends’ places, they wouldn’t be home because we all seem to scurry about shopping or finding somewhere to run on Sundays. Plus in today’s world, we may feel as if we’re imposing by stopping at someone’s house uninvited or unannounced.
We find it disheartening that the only Sunday visits we seem to have are the chats with people we run into during a quick trip to the grocery store or Wal-Mart. Visiting in the store aisle just isn’t the same as those warm conversations in a homey, comfortable living room.
I’m sorry to say that the only time we have a bountiful home-cooked Sunday dinner is when our birds come home to roost for a day or so. But distractions worm their way into our Sunday afternoons with the family. Televisions blare, cell phones beep with text messages or blasting ring tones, laptops fire up and are constant companions (I’m just as guilty as my kids on that one!), or people dash in and out with places to go and things to do. We don’t just sit and enjoy one another’s company. It seems Sundays aren’t either simple or special any more.
I’m pondering this question on Page 25, Chapter 10, of my book called Opportunity: what would happen if we just simply visited with each other one day a week – on Sundays? What would we miss? We might miss the Steelers football game. Or the latest status update on Facebook. Or downloading that favorite song. Or a text message from someone who wants to run to the shopping mall. Or spending the afternoon gathering groceries. But those things could wait.
What would we gain? Time spent together, truly conversing, sharing our stories and our lives with one another. And that would be priceless.
“A world without a Sunday would be like a man without a smile, like a summer without flowers, and like a homestead without a garden. It is the joyous day of the whole week.” ~Henry Ward Beecher
We’ve all heard of the proverbial “monkey on your back,” but have you ever heard of a monkey that has your back? Maybe one who is like the primate in this commercial from a couple of years ago:
From time to time, I think every one of us humans feels like we have a monkey on our backs, something that just seems to be a constant burden. Sometimes we just can’t figure out how to get away from that problem that weighs us down. Some of us can’t cope with an affliction that is just too difficult a load to carry by ourselves.
That’s where the monkey that has your back can help.
A few weekends ago, I attended a Women of Faith Imagine conference with one of my best friends, my life-long gal pal, Annie. I’ve written about her often and if you’re a regular follower of my blog, you’ve read about her before here.
Annie asked me a couple of months ago to attend the uplifting weekend of worship and encouragement with her and since I’ve never attended Women of Faith before, but always heard awesome things about it, I jumped at the opportunity to go.
My friend doesn’t live close to me, so we decided to stay overnight in a fancy, schmancy hotel near the arena where the conference was to be held instead of driving back and forth from the city. It promised to be a lot of fun, two old friends having a pajama party, just like all those nights we stayed at each other’s houses in our youth. We both were eager and excited when Annie swung by my house early Friday morning to pick me up for our drive into the city.
Friday morning’s sessions didn’t disappoint us. The first speaker was Sheila Walsh, a beautiful person with a beautiful voice and message. My pen flew across my notebook as I jotted down key points I wanted to remember. Listening to her sing “How Great Thou Art” was simply like hearing an angel – really, she gave me goosebumps.
Next up on the agenda, psychologist Dr. Henry Cloud asked us to imagine a place where we’d find happiness. Again my pen scurried across the open pages of my notebook. I nodded in complete agreement when he stated, “Only 10% of your happiness comes from circumstances.”
He imparted much truth to us from God’s Word and the wisdom God has granted him about letting go of the past, making necessary endings to reach our tomorrows, and about pruning areas of our lives. All of it was great stuff, so insightful and meaningful.
He declared that happy people are connected. Whoa, that hit home. I find myself writing a good deal about connections here in my blog and thinking about connections even more. I realized a long time ago that connections do bring me happiness, especially my real connection, my relationship with my Savior Jesus Christ.
Dr. Cloud also relayed a story that will stick with me for a very long time. The monkey story. (“Aha, there’s the connection!” you’re probably thinking.)
It seems that if you put a single monkey in a cage and bombard it with loud, annoying noises that startle the animal repeatedly and unexpectedly and shake its cage violently, you could frighten a monkey to death. I imagine the poor thing’s heart rate would rapidly accelerate, blood pressure would rise, and a sense of panic and alarm would overwhelm the creature.
Sounds like everyday life to some of us humans! But, according to Cloud, research reveals that if you put another monkey in the cage with the first one, continue the noises and frightening occurrences, both monkeys will survive and not be as greatly affected by the disturbances. Two monkeys will help one another cope, protect one another, support each other.
We need one another, just like those monkeys did, to get through our trials and burdens of life. So, Cloud instructed an arena of 8,000 women to “Go find yourself a monkey!”
If we were at the event with a good friend, he told us to look at her and say, “You’re my monkey!” Well, that initiated Annie’s and my theme for the weekend. I glanced at her, she turned to me, and we both laughed out loud and exclaimed, “You’re my monkey!” And you guessed it, all weekend we called each other “my monkey.”
The rest of the weekend was great – amazing music by Natalie Grant, Mary, Mary, and WOF worship team. We heard heartwarming talks from Lisa Harper, Nicole Johnson, Angie Smith, and Luci Swindoll. So much good food for thought crammed into two days.
But the thing I’m going to remember? Saturday afternoon, two older ladies we’d never seen before entered the arena after the break and sat down in our row. Both Annie and I noticed them, looked at each other, and stifled giggles. These two ladies each had a monkey hanging on them!
They proudly wore those long-armed, long-legged stuffed monkeys, the kind with the Velcro tabs in their hands, wrapped around their necks. One lady had a bright pink monkey, the other gal had a lavender one. We overheard them tell someone they had purchased their monkeys in their hotel gift shop.
I have never in my life tried so hard not to just break down in hysterical laughter. And what made it even funnier? My dearest friend, Annie, friend of my childhood, teenage years, and adulthood, turned to me and said, “I am NOT wearing a monkey around my neck for you!”
And that doesn’t matter because through thick and thin, youth and middle age, good times and bad, I know she has my back and I have hers. And that’s something significant that contributes to our happiness – a true friend, one who sticks with you no matter what, is your confidante, and also your accountability partner for life.
And those friends, our “monkeys,” are gifts from God. He sends us those people to come beside us and help us on our journey through this life. Many of you fulfill that role for me, and I hope and pray I am one of those gifts for you. I’m reminded on this 21st page of Chapter 10 in my yearly book of Opportunity that God’s Word tells us two are better than one.
“There was a man all alone; he had neither son nor brother. There was no end to his toil, yet his eyes were not content with his wealth. ‘For whom am I toiling,’ he asked, ‘and why am I depriving myself of enjoyment?’ This too is meaningless—a miserable business! Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up.” ~ Ecclesiastes 4:8-10
My prayer is that we all would have those people in our lives – those dear ones who listen when we struggle, offer encouragement to us in godly ways, and pray for us and with us as we endure the hardships of life.
The verdict is in and it’s not going to be a walk in the park. I’ve got a messy back, hip, and neck.
By messy, I mean those parts of my anatomy are all messed up. Even I, an untrained non-healthcare person, could see that from my x-rays. Add some arthritis to the squished up and skewed joints, it’s no wonder my body screamed every time I went up and down my stairs.
I suspect a cervical strain from a car accident I had over 20 years ago contributed significantly to my neck issues. I’ve suffered with neck pain and stiffness for a long while, and I’m pretty confident many of my headaches stem from that as well. And then there was that belly-flopping fall I took this past summer in my family room. That didn’t help my back or hip one bit.
I’ve had back problems before and visits to chiropractors fixed them right up. But that was several years ago when we lived in other states. I’d never visited a chiropractic doctor here in my hometown. So after some deliberation, I made an appointment. After an exam, medical history, and x-rays, the first visit involved some spine-tingling –an electric stimulation machine which I kept telling the assistant to crank up higher because I couldn’t feel it! Once I began sensing those pulsating vibrations, it actually felt pleasant.
Then came some stretching and pumping, which felt amazing and relieved that heavy-handed pressure on my lower back and hip. Some slight adjustments to start with and I experienced some relief immediately. With each treatment, the doc adjusts my neck and lower back a little more and I have to admit, it’s painful. I can’t quite understand how something can hurt so much yet at the same time feel so good, but that’s how I have to describe it. I’m already seeing improvement, but there will be more treatments to come and some therapy as well on my road to recovery.
How did I know I’d chosen the right health care provider? His caring attitude won me over. As did the fact that his father-in-law happens to be my optometrist (and I have a wonderful story about him to share sometime). And then through our conversation, I found out my new chiropractor’s father and brother live in the Pacific Northwest; his dad actually resides in our former suburb. So there were connections. I like connections. They make me feel….well,… connected. And the shape of my back, hip, and neck are definitely connected to my well-being.
Oh yeah, there was one more thing. As I sat in the waiting room for my first appointment, I glanced occasionally at the flat-screen TV to read the messages about chiropractic care shown there. I just happened to look up when this flashed across the screen…an animated picture of the Jackson 5 belting out “I Want You Back.” I did a double-take since I had just written about that song in my back-lamenting blog post the day before!
Today in my book called Opportunity, Chapter 10, Page 15, I’m taking that as a sign. I’m in the right place. I’m already moving well enough to take a little stroll in my hometown park. And maybe, just maybe, my chiropractor will get this body into shape to move and groove just like Michael Jackson did. What do you think? Think I’ll be dancing like this any time soon?? Okay, even I have to admit that would be a miracle, but a girl can dream, can’t she?
Politicians pontificate about the overwhelming, heavy public debt riding on each of our backs. Well, today, my friends, I feel like I’m personally carrying all that debt myself on my aching back.
You see, my back is out of whack. Really. I’m talking literally. My back’s been troubling me since last Thursday for no good reason.
I’ve tried recalling my recent activities in an attempt to figure out how my back got twisted up in knots. Did I lift something heavy that strained my back? Nope. Did I fall? Nah. Stumble? No. Fail to bend my knees when I picked up my suitcase? No way. So what the heck did I do to it? I have no idea whatsoever.
I don’t have an achy-breaky heart, I have an achy-breaky lower back. A back that impedes normal walking and screams in agony when I climb the steps (and oh, did I mention I live in a two-story house?). My out of sorts back doesn’t want to ache alone, so now it’s convinced my hip to join in and if that isn’t enough, there’s this pain running down the side of my leg. One day it extended to my knee, yesterday it worked its way down to the calf of that leg. I suspect the sciatic nerve is pinched, bunched, generally in a tizzy, or something akin to that and tomorrow I have an appointment with a chiropractor.
But for now, as I sit in my easy chair with my best friend, ibuprofen; a solid pillow propped behind me; and an ice pack on the afflicted area (20 minutes on, 20 minutes off), the only thing coming to my mind happens to be songs with the word back in them. Songs like the Jackson Five’s “I Want You Back.” Back, it’s true! Ooo, ooo, baby, I want you back. I want you, my healthy back, back.
And then there’s “I’m Bringing Sexy Back” by Justin Timberlake. Well, right now, my back’s not bringing anything, let alone sexy. I’d be ecstatic walking a normal gait instead of this shuffle, never mind a sexy swing.
Going the country music route, “Back Then” by Tim McGraw comes to mind. Tim, I don’t just miss back then “when a hoe was a hoe, coke was a Coke and crack’s what you were doing when you were cracking jokes,” I also greatly miss my back sans pain and the fact that this currently wacky back is preventing my evening strolls in the lovely fall weather.
And then there’s that Hall and Oates tune, “Baby Come Back,” which I would like to rename “Back Come Back.” Back, come back, any kind of fool could see, there was something in everything about you. Back come back, you can blame it all on me, I was wrong, and I just can’t live without you.
I’ve even gone to the deep recesses of my mind’s song treasure trove with “Carry Me Back to Ol’ Virginny.” Well, if this doesn’t let up soon, I’m not just going to need someone to carry me back to Virginia or anywhere else, someone just may have to carry me up the stairs!
So you can see, I’m feeling a little unhinged on Page 11, Chapter 10, in my book of Opportunity. I can’t get my back off of my mind. Seems like my back’s really got a hold on me…..oh wait, that’s another song, and I’d give anything to move like Smokey Robinson and the Miracles right now.
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” So begins the tale of two kitties.
I just had to borrow that famous first line from Charles Dickens’ masterpiece, A Tale of Two Cities, for today’s post. I humbly concede that I’m no great author. I certainly haven’t written any classic works of literature. I write a little bit on a personal blog and somehow manage to keep a few readers and subscribers entertained or interested enough to keep me on their cyber rotations.
But I digress from my tale. Up until last weekend, there were two cats living at my house. And I believed while it was the best of times, it was also going to become the worst.
To explain my rationale for it being the best of times, last month our oldest daughter moved back to our home state [yay!] after a few years living down South. Her plan was to move in with our middle daughter and her roommate in their apartment in the city, but until oldest daughter could arrange to visit the property management company, complete her application, get her name on the lease, and pick up a key, she bunked here with Mom and Dad temporarily.
She literally started her new job the day after she moved here, so between getting acclimated at her place of employment, unpacking a few clothes and necessary items, and driving back and forth to the city, she was swamped. But for Daddio and me, it was great having her here, so that explains the best of times.
When daughter moved in with us for those couple of weeks, her cat was a part of the package deal. That’s where I feared the worst of times would kick in and the tale (or should it be tail?) of two kitties ensued.
Kitty #1 is the domestic dominator of our domain, her domicile. She’s the queen bee, her royal highness. Her name is Callie, the calico cat, and she belongs to hubby and me – or maybe it’s the other way around, we belong to her.
Anyway, I was certain she would view Kitty #2 as the unabashed usurper of her utopia. Kitty #2 is oldest daughter’s huge black male cat who, as king of the hill, naturally ruled the roost at her apartment.
We expected this underling upstart named Jack would upset the reigning royalty, Queen Callie. So we kept them apart to avoid a catty confrontation complete with claws. See, Callie still possesses all of hers and Jack only has back claws. But he is male and huge and quite strong. And I convinced myself and everyone else that the two kitties probably should not meet.
Jack took up residence in our basement and was only allowed upstairs when Callie was outside or in the garage. Every time we let Callie in, we had to make sure Jack wasn’t around. It wasn’t too much of a problem at first, because Jack was skittish being in a new place, so he seemed happy to stay downstairs.
But as he adjusted to us and his temporary home, he wanted to come upstairs more often and was quite verbal about that.
The problem was that three adult people couldn’t seem to keep track of where Callie was at any given moment. Suffice it to say there was a lot of time wasted tracking down cats.
One night, Callie lounged on the kitchen floor. Oldest daughter had been checking on Jack’s food and water downstairs, playing with him a bit, and decided to bring him upstairs.
Uh-oh….prepare for the worst of times. At least that’s what I thought.
Callie looked at Jack as if to say nonchalantly, “Huh. Who are you?” She seemed totally unconcerned that this foreigner was in her territory. And she promptly continued lounging on the kitchen floor totally non-flustered by this new visitor.
Jack, however, was another story. Big, brawny Jack took one look at Callie, hissed, scrambled out of daughter’s arms, and turned into the epitome of a scaredy cat. He hightailed it down the basement stairs. Yep, he ran away. While Callie yawned and went back to sleep.
All my fears about having a cat fight in the middle of my house were unfounded. So all my worries about the tale of two kitties was just much ado about nothing. Jack is king of his own hill again exploring his new abode at that city apartment. And as I write about this in Page 6, in Chapter 10 of my Opportunity book, Callie is curled up at my feet sound asleep on a fleecy Steelers blanket.
Seems like it was just the best of times after all for us here at the empty nest, for Callie and even for Jack, for everyone… except for those Steelers. But that is another story.
“It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas everywhere you go”…….screeeeeeeeech…………..whoa, wait! Christmas is officially 57 days away. We haven’t even celebrated Thanksgiving yet! Back up the truck (or the calendar pages), we haven’t even hit the month of November.
The weather forecasters predicted this, but I scoffed when I heard their report. I expected maybe some snowy bits mixed in with rain, but not this. 
©2011 mamasemptynest.wordpress.com
I imagine those buggies full of families tucked inside were on their way to either church or social gatherings. 
A few weekends ago, I attended a 
If we were at the event with a good friend, he told us to look at her and say, “You’re my monkey!” Well, that initiated Annie’s and my theme for the weekend. I glanced at her, she turned to me, and we both laughed out loud and exclaimed, “You’re my monkey!” And you guessed it, all weekend we called each other “my monkey.”
©2011 mamasemptynest.wordpress.com
The verdict is in and it’s not going to be a walk in the park. I’ve got a messy back, hip, and neck.
©2011 mamasemptynest.wordpress.com
Kitty #1 is the domestic dominator of our domain, her domicile. She’s the queen bee, her royal highness. Her name is Callie, the calico cat, and she belongs to hubby and me – or maybe it’s the other way around, we belong to her.
But as he adjusted to us and his temporary home, he wanted to come upstairs more often and was quite verbal about that. 
