Day 263

Thanksgiving Day 2011 - 
This is the first time in over 39 years that I am not celebrating Thanksgiving Day with Wade. It's a little sad, I think. I've been thinking back on other Thanksgivings  - I remember years where we woke up extra early to stuff and place a humongous turkey in the oven. And I remember the year I was running a fever and he baked the whole dinner and I appeared very briefly at the table to greet our guests. And there was the one in 2000 in San Antonio, Texas - I was in the hospital and very luckily the doctor released me early. Wade and I walked (very slowly) through the grocery store, bought a small turkey roast, a few side dishes and he fixed the whole dinner that year. It was just the two of us, but that was just perfect for me. I had my best friend and he was taking good care of me. 
In honor of other Thanksgivings, I pulled some old pictures:

This is Wade and Kent (I think?) in Sacramento.  I don't know for sure if this is even near Thanksgiving but I just love all the plates of food.

This is at my parents' home in Sacramento. 

That's me and Jason. 1979.

This is the same year. That's Wade, Diane Watson, someone that was dating my brother Pete, and Pete.

This is one we had at The Little Yellow House Restaurant in Sacramento. I am not sure what year, but I think it was either 1982 or 1983 and it's with my dad after my mom died. 

Jason, Wade, and Tiffany (a sliver of her head is showing)

This one was in Hilmar, CA with Wade's mom, Dixie and her husband, Ray with Tiffany. 

This was at my dad's house. Rita, his wife is taking the picture. That's Wade, my dad, Tiffany (with the rabbit ears), me, Jennifer Lynn with Alysa, my brother, Pete, and Jason. 

This was dessert time. 

Jennifer, Jason, & Tiffany

This is another year at my dad's house. You can tell because the picture on the wall is the same as the one above.

And a few years later, at Tiffany's house.

Wade, me, and Shelby.

Here is the whole family in 2007 in Huber Heights. 

The kids are Shelby, Jaide, Sam, and Jared. 

The adults are Wade, Tiffany, Peggy, and Jason. 

And so we come to 2011 and what went on today:

Peggy and Jaide came up in the afternoon and helped prepare the food. Here they are making deviled eggs. Thank you for your help today. It went so much more smoothly. 

The table is set and waiting for everyone to get here. 

Peggy and Jason playing a game of Jenga while Jared watches. 

Here is the whole gang:

Jason, Jared, Peggy, Sam, Tiffany,

Shelby & Jaide.

So what did we eat???

 Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potato souffle (La Comedia's recipe), gravy, bread, corn, peas........

and pumpkin and

pecan pie. 

Happy Thanksgiving.

Day 262

Today is the day before Thanksgiving. First off, this morning I went to Kroger to finish buying groceries, etc. that I needed. I did pretty good. That was my second trip this week for Thanksgiving food. Well....... I got home and discovered a couple of other things I needed.... so I decided to make plans for another trip out later. 

I had an appoint-ment at 1:00 to meet with a car dealer and sit in a 2012 Honda Civic. That didn't take too long. I thought it was a very nice car. 
So after that was done, I made my third and final trip to the store. I am done -  so if we don't have it in the house now, we just need to do without. But I'm pretty sure that none of us are going to starve.... for a while, at least. 
Tonight I met with the Children's Ministry Team for dinner (provided by the church) at Perkins and discussion of the new schedules and spring musical. I had a chicken breast, baked potato, and asparagus. It was good and a nice treat. 
So tonight I'm washing laundry and relaxing. Tomorrow I will have a little more cleaning to do, a little baking and cooking to do, and lots of opportunities to enjoy my family. 
Wade had got a cold today and got some medical help although there is no 'doctor' on base. Hopefully he'll feel better tomorrow. 

Day 261

Tuesday - 
First off, this morning I skyped with Wade. According to him, he will be leaving Iraq during the first week of December and heading off for Afghanistan. He is ready to leave now, but is trying to hold off until that first week. We had a great visit, and again he told a joke that had me laughing like crazy. I love to laugh with him. We talked more about the motorcycle trip we will be taking when he comes back. So much fun to talk and plan. 
Now my project for today was to prepare Tiffany's Room. When we first moved into this house three and a half years ago, we named the room at the end of the hallway Tiffany's Room. Even though she didn't 'grow up' here, it is still called her room. The middle bedroom is called The Office -just because that's where the computer is. The Office is Wade's favorite room and he loves the view from that window. 
So anyway, Tiffany's Room has been sorely neglected for almost a year because no one has been here to use it. 

Here are empty bins and boxes, wrapping paper, 

no nightstands.....

Opie likes this room and 

here he's telling me to get busy and fix it up!!

And I also want to mention that the chest at the

end of the bed was built by my Uncle Sam Sampson. 

It's hard to see, but there is lots of dust in here too. 

So I took off the bedspread and pulled down the curtains and washed those today. 

This is more like it. I constucted that bookcase this morning too. 

There's a TV in there hooked up to Netflix, Apple TV, 

and a blu-ray dvd player. 

This looks better now too. 

You can barely see Opie sitting in the window. 

Is he watching for Tiffany?? 

Now if you go back to the picture with the bookcase next to the bed you will see books that I have placed there. I went through my bookshelves in the living room to put books into the bedroom. I took a couple of devotional books, a new book by Billy Graham, and a Bible (whenever I have guests, there is a Bible in the room with them). Anyway, I am going through the Bible to pull out anything I had taken notes on - which I am famous for and I actually found some buried treasure. 

This was folded and tucked into the front of this particular Bible. It is a note written to me from Wade. I started reading it and I just thought he had placed it there before he left home in March. And I was just enjoying a personal love note from him explaining that six months (although he is supposed to be gone a year) is not that long, and it will probably go by very fast. But I finally discovered that this was not written this year. At the end, he writes, ".......have fun, spoil the grandkids, spoil the dog......." THE dog - as in singular. And now we have THREE dogs. So this note was written to me in March of 2004 before he left for Afghanistan. But it could have very easily been written for this year. So I took my time to read it and re-read it. It is buried treasure for me today....... I think God knew I needed to read this today. 

Day 260

It's been cold and damp and drizzly all day long. That seems like normal fall weather to me. 
I went to visit my little mentee at the school this morning. I brought her the usual small box of donut holes. She likes the chocolate ones the best so that's all I buy now. I did forget the peanut butter crackers I usually bring, so I promised her double next week. She was very talkative this morning - she bubbled over with news about her family and other things for almost 30 minutes. Then we had to do a spelling test and finished up our time playing Connect 4. It was a fun time. 
I dropped in to Hannah House for just about an hour. Not much going on and I got October financial reports ready for tonight's board meeting. 

I did some shopping at Walmart today. Picked up a couple of book-shelves for Tiffany's room. And I bought some groceries and I do believe I have almost everything I need for the Thanksgiving meal. 
Tonight after dinner I went to handbell rehearsal and then the board meeting at the Hannah House. 

It's still cold and drizzling. I was very surprised at how many houses in the neigh-borhood around the Hannah House already have Christmas lights and elaborate decorations!! Really people??? I need to celebrate Thanksgiving first!!!

Day 259

Sunday - 
Teaching Kindergarteners and 1st graders this morning. I had 14 and this was the roughest Sunday of the month. The story part went very well, but my craft helper happened to 'slip' out of the room and I was doing one-on-one activities that should have been shared, but I didn't say anything. Luckily everything was cut out and each place setting was set up before class. But then 10-15 minutes before class was to be over, some Wednesday night teachers came and took the children because they were going to be singing during the morning worship service. Now, obviously I let them go, but I was disappointed because they did not get to finish their ravens before they left - they did not get to walk down the hallway and hang them on the wall - they did not get to draw their journal page - they did not get snack. If I had known ahead of time - I would have been prepared and adjusted my time for their benefit. Ah well............... So Jared, Jaide, and some of her friends were kind enough to help finish them up and hang them on the walls. 

The beaks have double-sided tape on them and hard candies are placed there for the adults to help themselves to. Next week is the last week and I will have the 5th and 6th graders. Jaide said she is looking forward to making her raven next week. Now, as for the 2 dozen pumpkin muffins....... I brought them home and they are in the freezer. I have company coming next week and if I need to, I can pull those out too. 
Lunch was provided today by Jason & Peggy. We had:

Sausage & Onion Quiche

Chicken & Broccoli Quiche

Biscuits / Peach Slices

Yogurt & Granola

Excellent meal - thank you very much. 

It's a gray and rainy day. Not too cold but just kind of dreary. It was a very quiet afternoon here. 

Day 258

This morning I woke up a little earlier and was greeted by Jared in the hallway. I'm not sure how long he was awake, but he won the prize for being the first one up. We both ate a banana and watched the movie "The Tale of Despereaux" while we waited for Jaide to wake up. Then we headed off to Frisch's for breakfast. After that we went to the Dollar Tree where we each had seven dollars to spend. That's a fun thing. One of my purchases was two of these:

These are for our guests that will be arriving on Thursday. I hope Sam and Shelby like them........... just kidding..........
This afternoon I finished putting in all the storm windows and that makes me very happy.
Here are pictures of the office. I can't believe how uncluttered it seems. This room is usually where I put things that I don't want in the kitchen or living room. 

 There's Angel and Kelly following me around.

 The work desk. And if you look really, really close..... 

Opie is sleeping in his favorite spot on the chair. 

There will be plenty of room to open up the Clik-Clak and also blow up a mattress if we need to. 

It was a busy afternoon too. I finished putting all the storm windows in and we should be comfortable until next spring. A little before 1:00, we all went to the Enon VFW hall for football awards. That took about 90 minutes, but both Jaide and Jared got a nice looking trophy. 

Then I prepared the materials for my Sunday School class and made my 36 pumpkin muffins. This weekend I sent 12 downstairs because I know for sure I won't need that many. Next weekend will be my last one for making muffins for kids.

Now tonight I'm just catching up on television shows and washing some clothes. 

Day 257

It was a pretty cold morning. I went out to move the garbage cans and get the newspaper and this was how the yard looked. Notice how empty the trees look. We still have not had snow fall here yet. 

It doesn't look cold, but it was. And if you look closely, Angel is sitting at the side gate watching me. 

The ground is a little bit 'crunchy'.

And there was frosty etchings on the car.

I do believe it was a little bit colder than this. Maybe in the 20's. But this is up on the porch and not out in the open. 

I got to skype with Wade this morning. We had a nice discussion about the motorcycle trip we will take when he finally comes home. I kept thinking about our plans all day today and spent some time looking at maps this afternoon.

Plus, I had a pretty productive day at home. I cleaned out the office. And I cleaned out closets and took things to Goodwill. Watching a few episodes of 'Hoarders' always does that to me. I keep way too much stuff here at the house and it's good to get rid of some of it. 

I've decided to take on one room each day and get it cleaned up for Thanksgiving company. So, today was the office - and it's nice and clean now. Then I vacuumed the whole house, washed dog bedding, and got storm windows put in the windows in the office, living room and kitchen. I'll put in the rest of the storm windows tomorrow. 

This evening I had Jaide and Jared for dinner, movie, and sleepover. We had Papa Johns pizza, corn on the cob, potato chips and honey crisp apples. We watched "Judy Moody and the NOT Bummer Summer" - a cute movie geared for pre-teen girls (although there was a younger brother that held Jared's interest) and then we watched "Beethoven's Christmas Adventure". That was a so-so movie. I could take it or leave it and my mind wandered a lot during that movie. 

Before bed we played a couple of games of dominos. They have never played dominos, so it was more of an introductory session. 

Now they're asleep and I'm watching a little TV before I head off to bed too. I think they'll probably be awake earlier than me tomorrow.