Sister, Can You Lend a Hand?

It's been an interesting evening here for me tonight! A bit confusing at times, I must admit, but fun, all the same. It also gave me a great feeling too when, after at least an hour -possibly two -on the phone with a very good friend from way back, I was able to help get her started with her very own Facebook account!

It's a bit more confusing to get an account set up now, I think, than it was when I first signed on. Back then, it was really easy and -to my way of thinking -also very straightforward. Now, with some of the changes they have made to the set-up and all, trying to walk another person through the process -over the phone -and explaining what this or that or something else is for or what it does -especially when, like me, you aren't exactly the most literate person around about Facebook, but we managed and finally got her page working!

It's been quite a busy weekend here -or longer than that I guess since my last post. I've been lost in my own little world several times and then again, since the last post I put up here. Now, I get confused with whether or not I wrote about something on my blog or did I only put this or that up on my Facebook and not here -or was it vice versa?

But anyway, let's try and backtrack a little bit and I'll play some "catch-up ball" with things pertaining to me, my family, home, getting ready for the holidays and what not, whatever else may pop into my severely depleted brain cells tonight.

Starting with this picture for you to gaze upon!

This is the handmade wreath our good friend, Joe Kolivoski, made for us and it is hanging on our front door now -in all its shining glory! Isn't it just gorgeous though? Because the light in the area of our front door isn't the best -virtually non-existent at times -I had to use the "low-light" setting on my camera and in doing that, it makes the greens of the wreath look like they are white or at the very least, tinged with snow. It's not that color at all and is actually a very pretty dark hemlock green. So, when you look at it, picture it as being this dark green color and not looking all white under the bow.

Last week, we got the two orange kittens -brothers, they are -delivered to their new home and owners and this coming Wednesday, if all goes as planned and the weather stays decent enough to travel down to Bellefonte, I will be delivering the little gray calico (girl) kitten to the grandmother of the little girl who will be the "owner" of this sweetheart of a kitten. She really is a cutie and I can't see how any 3-year-old WON'T just fall in love with her on first sight and the two will bond forever@

That will leave us then with just one male -the really pretty orange male with the white face and chest - and if Mandy can find a new home for Nina -the Mama cat -then we will keep "Flutter-nutter" as Mandy likes to call this particular kitten. I have nothing against good old Nina, basically and honestly, I don't but the thing is, she hates Sammy, the dog and try and he does to get her to be friends with him, I guess that just isn't going to happen. So, maybe -since Sammy gets along greatly with "Flutter-nutter" it would work better then if we could keep him and let Nina go with some other family I suppose!

Last night was our annual St. Lucia pot luck dinner and program at church -as we welcomed this year's St. Lucia and her court to grace us for the evening. The weather wasn't the best -freezing rain in the morning even caused the cancellation of our regular Sunday morning services but by 5 p.m., it was just a bit of misting and lots of fog -only a few patches of ice on parking areas and such.

Here's the picture of this year's St. Lucia -portrayed by Susan Eyerly - and her full court. Because of the weather, our attendance was down a good bit for the dinner and program and we had no young boys present last night at all so there were no "star boys" to accompany St. Lucia and her assistants. But we did have a new one in the lineup of those attending St Lucia last night and she's the second from the left in the picture. Yep, that's my granddaughter, Miss Maya, making her very first appearance in the St. Lucia procession. Note that all the other attendants are each holding a lit candle while Maya is merely holding a white candle -not a lit one though. For obvious reasons of safety, we decided not to place a lit candle in her hands just yet! But although she was a bit skittish initially about taking part in the ceremony, she ultimately decided to do it and once up in front of everyone, showed how much of a little ham she really is then too! The court in this picture consists of (from left to right) Rachel Araway, Maya Wagner, Sarah Haller, St. Lucia (Susan Eyerly), Savannah Mabie and Kylie Moriarity, wearing the typical Swedish peasant dress costume.

The food at the dinner was excellent -as it always is -and we finished off the night by the members of the past and current senior choir coming forward to do a rousing rendition of the favorite Swedish Christmas song "Lyssna, Lyssna!" I had my son use my camera and try to get a video of us singing -which he did, sort of, except for one small thing. He stopped the video before we, the choir, stopped singing the song so it sort of ends quite unexpectedly. (Only a minute and 35 seconds worth of us singing our pea-picking little old hearts out. I don't have it converted to a U-tube video so will not be posting it on here, at least not at this juncture!

We did, unfortunately, have some very bad news about a boy from our church though who was accidentally shot Friday nite and is in serious condition at a large hospital east of here after having to be life-flighted there around midnight Friday night. He was quite fortunate in that the bullet didn't hit any major organs or his spine -but did do a good bit of damage to his small intestine. So far, he is recovering as well as can be expected this soon after the injury and we're all hoping things will keep improving as rapidly as is possible and that he will be able to be back home before Christmas anyway. So, if you're of the praying sort, please remember him in your prayers, if you don't mind. A few more prayers sure can't hurt anything, can they?

Last night, when we went out to the church for the dinner, the SIL wasn't quite ready and we had to get out there, get the food Mandy and I had prepared out and ready to be dished out ya know, so Mandy and the kids and I left in my jeep with the SIL to follow as soon as he finished getting ready.

Well, we were all seated and well into the meal when the phone rang in the Sunday School Social hall and it was for Mandy! Seems the SIL had run into some problems. He was going to drive out in Mandy's car but he had paid no attention to Mandy's telling him that the gas gauge on this car doesn't work (no surprise ya know that a mechanic wouldn't pay attention to this on a car within his own family, is it now?) but he hopped into her car and started on his way -the drive that is all of about 4-5 miles only to have the car die on him at the intersection about 1/2 mile or so up the road from our house. Somehow, he managed to get the car back down to sitting in the middle of the road in front of our house but not in the parking area so he decided to take drastic steps to push it off the road and into the icy parking area we have by pushing it with his pickup truck. He pushed it by doing it nose-to-nose -with the front end of his truck lining up -or so he thought -to the front end of Mandy's car. Unfortunately, this created yet another problem in that is sort of left a nice big old dent in the hood of Mandy's car!

So he called us at the church to tell us of his dilemma and that he wouldn't be out there then. My son finished eating and left to come down to the house and see if he could help the SIL finish getting the car off the road and with no further damages to the car.

Needless to say, this has not made for a really happy household then or today as Mandy was a bit putout by his taking those drastic steps and ending up denting the hood of her car -the newest vehicle she's ever had and one that, prior to this mishap, looked pretty doggone nice too!

Oh well, what can ya say about things like this that happen with this family other than it's just a bit more drama added to other drama, which in turn is added to yet more drama and so, the saga continues I suppose!

And today, I had a lovely little trip over to my doctor's office in Curwensville so she could talk to me about the results of some blood work she'd had me have done about a month ago now. Seems that there are a few issues with the blood results and those issues made it necessary for my doctor to utter to very nasty words to me - DIET and EXERCISE! Yes, I am now under orders that I have to watch my diet, intake, etc., and do some kind of exercise -whatever my stiff leg joints will handle I guess -and return in 3 months, hopefully having shed more than a few pounds and with my blood sugar under control as well as the nasty cholesterol too! YUCK!

Not that I don't agree with her over the fact that it sure wouldn't hurt me to lose more than a few pounds -because I've known that for the past 3-4 years or more now. But sheesh -to have to curb my intake of pastas (which I love) and sweets (which I do like but I don't really indulge THAT much on them -other than the ice cream) and the exercise -well I guess that means I probably am going to become the designated walker now for Sir Samuel J. Muttley, doesn't it? Sure does look like things will be going that way for me. Say a prayer that the D&E doesn't totally do me in, will ya?

And that pretty much takes us up to the current time now -which is almost midnight -and time for me to get to bed! Oh and that brings one more thing up too -I lost my bed buddy tonight now too! Mandy finally got the bedroom upstairs all set up so now, both Maya and Kurtis are sleeping in the same room, in their own respective little beds and Grammy now gets to sleep alone!

Well, the nice thing about that is that I don't need to worry about waking up in the middle of the night with a very wet behind so I guess that's the good that comes of this transition, isn't it?

Nite now and God Jul, too!