the christmas tree(s).

...yes he did. and that was really sweet. tomorrow afternoon. a tree and a wreath (and trimmings so I can decorate the two mantels and the dining room).

but then tonight as we were talking about specifics and I said I also wanted to get two more artificial trees - one for the front porch and one for our advent calendar, he got all "what - five trees?!"

yes. five. I'm willing to give on the one for the porch, but the four for inside I feel pretty strongly about.

it's all the decorating I really do. well, besides those trimmings.

one big (live) tree.
a tree for my bird ornaments.
a tree for our holiday words.
a tree for our "advent calendar" (this was "live" last year, but I want lights...and I think a small artificial tree is a good investment here).

just four. perfectly reasonable, right?!

wordless wednesday.

currents.

a bright beginning for the week...seen on our walk this morning

celebrating ...feels like I've been celebrating for weeks now! beginning with my dad's 75th at callaway,  then sara's 21st (twice) and my 50th...oh yeah, and an anniversary thrown in for good measure.

hoping the new outfit I've planned for marc's company party this saturday "works".

planning what I'm going to put where (and just a few new things to add) when I unpack the christmas boxes this weekend.

practicing how to get from here to there. I'm still amazed at how much different the driving is from our new house. learning new roads. and timing. and a few shortcuts (at least I think they are!)...very grateful for the gps in my car!

training (still) for a half marathon on march 17. I printed out a training plan this morning. I've been running for 30-some years, but I'm definitely a novice for this distance!

enjoying seeing more of katie (and rob :-) and really excited about them moving even closer next summer.

reading cloud atlas... it's taken me two weeks to read just a few pages and that's not because the book isn't good; I've just been too tired when my head finally hits the pillow.

knitting christmas gifts. and a scarf for myself. I have two sweaters waiting in the wings for when I finish the christmas projects. I think I'll be ready for them by then!

watching not much. we have six episodes of boardwalk empire queued up on the dvr. I wonder when we'll get back into that routine!

listening to christmas music. we have uverse and channel 500 has a great christmas station. in my car, it's mostly xm's traditional christmas (channel 4).

eating last week's leftovers. I think tonight will be the end... sadly. but I did make split pea soup today!

drinking more water. at least I'm trying to.

wearing jeans with a camisole, a black cardigan and my weeble wobble cowl. and flats (loving flats this season!)

five things.

the not-secret knitting project. hope it grows a lot by the end of this weekend!

1. if I'd done a good job at yarn substitution for my annie scarf (the project shown above), I would've doubled the yarn in the border...but I didn't. and I'm ok with that.

2. yesterday was lovely. and I do love my daughters.

3. I will do a blog post about this house. next week. (promise :-)

4. katie and I ran four miles this morning. my first run in ... six weeks (maybe more). it was chilly but not freezing. except for my thumbs and my earlobes. enjoyed the run together and excited about "officially" training for the half marathon in march.

5. looking forward to decorating for christmas. this morning we sorted through all the boxes of "stuff" and I'm left with five. favorite ornaments, decorations, books, movies, "stuff"... can't wait to see how it all works in the new space.

wordless wednesday.

thankful right this minute.

...no surprise, carole's prompt today is about being thankful. and of course it's a list of only ten things. no way I can be complete, so I've decided to be quick. ten things for which I am thankful right this minute.

1. my husband. I've known him for over 33 years and we've been married for 29 years (yesterday). I can't imagine my life without him, or...

2. my daughters. I hate to list them together because they are two very different people but for this list, they count as one! I know I am truly blessed to have grown daughters who count me as friends. every day, they make me want to be the best person I can be. and right this minute, I'm thankful that they're covering me while I get my bumpers fixed!

3. holly... sitting in my lap as I type this. warm. cozy.

4. my health. whew! I celebrated my 50th birthday this past weekend with a few long walks. and I'm training to run a half marathon in march. exercise keeps me sane...and fit!

5. my family. love that my sister and sister-in-law are friends more than family. and that my parents and brother and neices and nephew (the one who's still at home) came for my birthday party. I hope someone took photos of the people...mine are (almost all) all of the drinks and decor.

6. my friends. ok, yeah, that birthday thing again. but really, it makes me realize how many friends I have. and how much I love them for loving me!

7. the weather. we had a really hot summer and we might still have a cold winter, but so far, our fall has been beautiful. they're predicting highs in the 60's for thanksgiving day. and the trees still have a few colorful leaves.

8. plenty of food. marc and I are diligently working through the weekend's leftovers to make room for more come thursday. more than enough is an easier "problem" than the not enough so many have.

9. this on-line community. I've been away a bit these past two months and I've missed it. it's special to share pieces of my life with y'all and have the opportunity to see pieces of yours too.

10. icloud. ok, you knew I'd get to something technology and mac-related at some point? right before we moved (in fact the day the movers came!) I upgraded my mac software so my phone and ipad and laptop could all share...contacts, calendar, photos, notes... it has been a lifesaver these past few weeks that I have ONE version of everything accessible from any of my favorite devices.

ok there you have it. a little bit sweet. a little bit silly. and a lot to be thankful for!  how about you?

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five things.

8:30 pm thursday

1. I've seen a few five things friday posts pop up in my google reader. seems like a great idea...and sounds so much more planned than what it really is...a random list of five things!

2. the kitchen island is my new favorite place in the house. it's big enough that even my big messes don't fill it up! and the light is great. and it's in the middle of things so when marc's home, we can spend time together (most nights he's got his laptop open on the kitchen table, or he's on the couch watching tv - the island is talking distance to both).

3. my friend virginia came over last night. we shared a bottle of wine and talked for a few hours. it was wonderful to catch up. and she brought me that treat-filled (a gorgeous frame, vera bradley jumbo binder clips and a starbucks card - yes, she knows me very well!) pink bag for my birthday. 

4. yesterday's plans went completely by the wayside when we discovered on wednesday that our heat didn't work. I got things shuffled around (including an all-important hair appointment) and the heat is now fixed and today's schedule is super busy. holly & I are going for a walk, my parents are coming for  lunch and a look at the new house, I've got another all-important waxing appointment this afternoon, and a manicure.

5. good thing there's an extra day in my 50th year...I'm needing every last minute!

wordless wednesday.

project life weeks 24 through 34.

...whoa. I knew it had been a while, but until I took the photos of the finished spreads this morning and saved the slightly edited versions, I had no idea it had been eleven weeks. nearly three months. of course it seems like that long when I look back at each page, but still...

the first four of those weeks had been partially completed back in september; I had the photos in place, and most of the ephemera, but I needed to add a few more details and the journaling. thank goodness for post-it notes to remind me what I'd originally intended.

week 24 (august 26 - september 1)

week 25 

week 26 

week 27

these weeks look like the ones that preceeded them - a mix of photos and "stuff" and a few journaling cards thrown in. I did tweak cathy zielske's life list cards to document things we did specifically for the new house.

 and then I got to the catchup phase. I shared a photo on instagram friday night of the mess of ephemera and notes that I started with.

it got worse before it got better :-)  I decided on two three week spreads, pre-closing/move and post-closing/move with two 6x12 spreads in the middle to document our 2-day walk and my dad's 75th birthday weekend. good thing marc was gone all weekend, because I had all the counters in my kitchen full of project life until about 9pm last night! here's how those six weeks turned out.

weeks 28 - 30 (september 23 - october 12) 

a close-up of the front of the 2-day walk page

and the back - and the front of my dad's birthday page

and the back of the birthday page and the right side of the three-week spread

weeks 31 - 33

and one close-up. my pile of ephemera was impressive! the quotation in the lower right is written on an envelope I'd already embossed with my old address. and of course I LOVE the queen of hearts shopping list. (maybe they do project life, too?!)

and last but not least, in "real" time, week 34.

in addition to everything else I'm loving about this approach to documentation, I now would add "flexibility". really, it was pretty easy to adapt the format to make it work. I am looking forward to staying caught up and hopefully doing more real time entries for december (in place of december daily). we'll see how that goes!

fifty for 50 with one week to go.

...yep, day 366 of my fiftieth year is next friday. and naturally that has me thinking a lot about what I had planned for this year...and what I've actually done. I just revisited my august 9 post with the 100-day plan and almost laughed out loud to think how much has changed in just those few short months.

we did the 2-day walk and raised over $2,500. (more coming on that after we draw the winners for the quilt and coasters next week.)

we celebrated my dad's 75th and sara's 21st birthdays.

and I completed two more needlepoint projects (sshhh...they're a secret!) and learned at least six new stitches.

I did not get to chattanooga to visit martha - but she came to see me last weekend with her two little ones. in no time it seemed like it had been just a few days since we'd seen each other instead of a few months...and I will definitely get up to see her in early 2013 (a few of us from our knitting group are talking a road trip which is good since I don't want to drive by myself!)

nor did I make much progress on the church's prayer shawl ministry beyond forming a committee...and securing a commitment to move forward; I'm thinking now it needs to wait til january.

and I am not taking on any new classes (in fact I stopped working at the shop except to teach the three classes I already have...just not enough time!)

but I started cooking again. three healthy dinners (split pea soup, turkey meatloaf and sara's birthday dinner) and one fabulous dessert. I even used the leftover potatoes from the birthday dinner to make oven roasted potato chips (with blue cheese dip) when my sister came for knitting wednesday night.

I did get the guest room cleaned out (along with the rest of my house!) and katie and I made a start at organizing pre-2003 photos (and now all those photos are neatly stacked in six boxes in my craft room closet...at least they're all in one place!)

...and I finished knitting the 12 charity hats. and remembered to take a photo before I handed them off to lou (she leads our charity knitting at the shop) to take to the homeless shelter.

those hats put a nice dent in my single/double skein stash and I love that they're going to keep twelve heads a little warmer this winter. it's got me wanting to play a more active role with our shop's charity knitting for 2013. we're talking about knitting mother bears for a local children's hospital. fun knitting for a wonderful cause.

and last but not least -  43 more random acts of kindness.  so far I've bought coffee for the people behind me at starbucks, paid tolls for the next car and delivered donuts to the vet. those are certainly fun, but I'd love some other ideas - please share!

wordless wednesday.

10 things on my mind right now.

see #5 below

...what a great prompt to re-join the ten on tuesday fun! (thanks, carole!) gonna do this quick, before my busy brain has a chance to change the list:

1. it's raining...hope the line to vote isn't long. I really don't want to stand outside in the cold wet.

2. holiday knitting plans.

3. project life. going forward and catching up.

4. trying out two new pilates dvd's; sadly, the studio where I was taking classes is just too far away now (welcome other dvd recommendations!)

5. knitting myself a winter white cardigan. yep, I pulled the trigger on november knits and tanis gray's market jacket (which meant frogging chaleur...oh well).

6. need to draw winners for the 2-day quilt and coasters.

7. next steps for the prayer shawl group at church.

8. fixing the bumper(s!!! yes - I've banged up both the front and rear!) on my car.

9. wedding details (katie has been really patient with me these past few months and now I need to get in there and help).

10. a manicure and a pedicure...and a fresh cup of coffee!

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celebrating 21.

...with sara last night. complete with champagne cocktails,

katie's ginger simple syrup, a splash of st germaine, a twist...and champagne

dinner,

dessert (I made this rosemary olive oil ice cream to accompany the tart - delicious!),

laughter,

this was probably my favorite part of the evening - watching these two together on the couch sharing their own jokes

photo opportunities,

and best wishes for a wonderful year.

ugh, still blurry...even after I got her to blow out the candle a second time - more wishes!

happy birthday, dear sara - I'm so glad we got to spend it together!

hello november.

late afternoon walk on november 1 - on the sidewalk across the street from my house

...I've been looking forward to seeing you for weeks! now that the packing and unpacking is behind me, I can enjoy your cooler temperatures. love being able to wear a sweater with skinny pants and flats and the beautiful cashmere scarf that sara brought me from florence. and shorter days. honestly, this one's hard for me, but I'm giving it my best effort - focusing on cozy nesting and comfort foods (I bought a slow cooker and I can't wait to try it)...and knitting. birthday celebrations and family parties. you always remind me how blessed I am and for that and so much more, I say thank you!

a look back at october.

...a month that saw lots of activity. big changes and big celebrations, with just enough plain ordinary thrown in to keep our sanity.

you can see all the details and descriptions here

we are settling into our new home. the boxes we intend to unpack are unpacked. there are a few more pictures to hang (and we're adjusting to a few empty walls). and it feels good to simply enjoy it. I'm looking forward to getting back into my routines. daily walks and daily photos (thank goodness for the iphone - it was the only way I could keep up these last three weeks). pilates. running. blogging. knitting. and getting back in touch with this wonderful online community. I've missed y'all!