catching up

I seem incapable of finishing a blog post these days off. I have a couple I started but then got distracted and then it was the next day. Plus, I've been working more days in the antique store, covering for my sister.

Today we drive into the city to dole out the gifts to the grandkids and daughter and SonIL. They all left on the Saturday before Christmas to go spend the holiday with Mike's brother and cousins and also Sarah's cousins on Marc's side in Dallas.

My SisterIL had called us the week before christmas asking us if we were planning on coming since the kids were, they would love to have us visit, but we declined. We had just finished the mountain wall and the last thing we wanted to do was take a four hour drive to Dallas and a four hour drive back. Besides, we were dog sitting and I had to work at the store.

So here are my two incomplete posts:

Sunday, December 23^rd...

I have been puttering with the best of them today. Or maybe more like a butterfly and flitting from thing to thing. I picked up a couple of handfuls of pecans and got most of the fallen leaves out of the garden intending to go back and tend to it after I ate a late breakfast.

The garden is in sad shape since we haven't been here to take care of it and the few days of the week we were in residence about all I had time for was making sure it got watered. It's not weedy but all the fallen leaves had blown in and there was a heavy mulch around all the plants. That's a good thing for flowers but not so good for food plants because it harbors food plant eating bugs. Everything except for the broccoli, I think, has aphids and pill bugs and some kind of little bitty back beetle. It's a mess.

But by the time I was ready to go back out a strong wind had come up and although the temperature is in the mid-70s, it's no fun being out in it. So I am entertaining myself indoors today. I've made one stab at washing the dishes from yesterday. That being my chore I'm constantly confounded by how fast they pile up and there is just two of us!

I have other tasks I am entertaining like juicing three bags of meyer lemons that my friend Kathy foisted off on generously gave me when we went to pick up our stuff from the open house.

I also want to photograph the individual little pediment pieces I cast for the open house. That involves cleaning off and setting up a suitable area and unpacking them all from the box they are in which sounds like a lot of effort. Maybe I'll just aim for getting them unpacked.

And I need to go over to my sister's house and check on the cats and while I'm at it I'll go by the store and get my book which I inadvertently left yesterday when I closed up. It's handy having keys to the store.

Thursday, December 27^th...

Today is Marcmas around here. That's how we refer to Marc's birthday. It's cold and overcast, drizzly and rainy out there and will warm up some but it will still be colder than the 65˚ we keep the house. We slept late, snuggled in bed, and are still in our lounging clothes.

I'm not working in the store today and the dogs go home this afternoon. Probably we will take them home so they will be waiting there for my sister when she gets in. Usually she just picks them up on her way home from the airport but I think we will go to a movie later. That's always our fall back birthday gig.

I can't believe it's been over a week since we finished the 'big job' and I have not lifted a single finger towards cleaning up my drawing desk, computer area, and work table. Actually I made a bigger mess when I brought the drill press in to make a little teacup bird feeder for my sister. And one for me. It's still sitting here on the end of my work table. The drill press, I mean.

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Well, we did not get to see the Hobbit after all. We arrived for the 3:45 show to a full parking lot and adults streaming in. Why aren't all these people at work?! Anyway, the ticket seller was kind enough to tell us that it was pretty crowded in there and it would probably be difficult to find two seats together, so not wanting to watch a nearly 3 hour movie on the first couple of rows or separated, we put it off for another day. Instead, we rented Rise Of The Dark Knight from Redbox and watched that. It was terrible BTW.

So, off to the city we go.