Messiah!

Every Christmas for the past four years I have sung in a community choir. The first two years we sang the Christmas parts of the Messiah, which I love. The next year was John Rutter's Magnificat and last year was a selection of Christmas music from the 1400s to the present day. The Magnificat was really hard because it was almost all in Latin with which I am unfamiliar. I really liked last year's selections although one was in French and was a doozy to learn as, well, I don't speak French either. It turned out to be my favorite piece though.

Each year the wonderful director has mentioned doing a concert for Easter but it has never actually happened. Until this year! Since we haven't done any Messiah for two years and the Easter part hasn't been done in our town for seven years, that's what she decided to do. I hadn't sung all the choruses in that section previously, but all are very, very familiar to me as I've listened to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir sing it dozens of times on their 1958 album.

Thursday night rehearsals are my favorite look-forward-to event of the week and I'm glad it's Thursday late afternoon now.

Second step on the doll quilt

The next installment insisted I embellish this quilt and I am really not into embellishment but then it suggested some buttons. Buttons I can do. I have lots of buttons although I don't usually put them on children's playthings. However, my youngest is nearly five so I figured it was okay. Camera battery died, so I used the scanner. You can see the four buttons I sewed on the one square. The yellow dots are the pins for basting. I ended up using a piece of a sheet I found in my fabric drawer as the backing. It's blindingly white.

Conferences, pot luck dinner, weight loss

Today are Parent Teacher Conferences at the girls' school. It's going to be a love/hate situation, I know. One of my girls will get glowing compliments about her academic work, but a few words about her behavior as well. In the other classroom I'll be told how far behind my daugher is in reading and other subjects and be told (again) they are thinking about holding her back this year. Mark my words.

We had a pot luck dinner at church last Saturday. Other than its starting at 7 pm which is really late for a dinner with lots of children in attendance, it was a nice event. I like pot luck dinners because you never know what will show up. There were loose assignments to make sure everyone didn't bring a salad, but nothing past that. I found that in New Mexico if you are assigned to bring a main dish, you'll probably bring either lasagne or enchiladas/enchilada casserole. I brought enchilada casserole. I was surprised to find out that if your husband is assigned to bring a dessert not EVERYone will bring brownies. I really thought they would. Maybe some of the wives stepped in? Because of taking Alli I couldn't enjoy the dessert table like I really wanted to, but I probably avoided 1,000 calories that way. I guess that's the point, right?

And speaking of weight, I've been on a plateau for a week. I need to do something to get the scale moving again. Maybe some actual exercise? I put an audio book on my MP3 player so I ought to get out and walk around town while I listen to it.

Doll quilt

After making a twin bed sized quilt last month, I'm making a doll quilt this month. I kind of went the wrong direction, didn't I?

I found this tutorial that will guide me to make it over two weeks' time. I'll admit I already know how to finish this thing off, but decided to do it at the pace the writer of the tutorial is going to put her blog up. The girls are suddenly very interested in dolls and wrapping them up, so this is a good time to make it.

I'm excited about this little project because I finally get to use some fabric that was not bought new, but was part of clothes the girls wore. The border fabric is from a dress my mom bought Holly from Lands' End when she was a size 4. After going through all four of my girls as well as my stepdaughter, the dress was finally ready for the rag bag. The blue-purple floral was from dresses my mom and I made for my twins when they turned two. We made two of them, but one of them met an untimely demise during the time they fit my youngest. I cut the pieces from the hem area so you can see the wear lines on them. The other fabrics are from dresses I made for the twins when they turned three and the cream is from the backing of the quilt I just finished.

Stay tuned for more exciting news about this quilt. Hehe.

Taking advantage of lovely weather

Even though I live in the Southwest United States, that doesn't mean my weather is like that of Phoenix or Las Vegas. Those two locations are considered low desert and the weather there is searingly hot in the summer, hot at night, and very pleasant in the winter. I live in a high desert location at nearly 7,000 feet above sea level. The summers are hot and pleasant with cool nights and the winters bring snow and always subfreezing temps at night. So when we have a few days in the 50s (10+ for you Celsius users) I take advantage by hanging my laundry out to dry. This is the view out my laundry room window. In this load I bleached everything I could find that could take bleaching.

Using bleach always reminds me of my grandmother. My mom wasn't/isn't a big bleach user (probably why our clothes lasted a long time!), but my grandmother was. Until I was a young adult she had a wringer washer on her back porch, no dryer. She was on a country well and water was precious and she liked the wringer washer because she could make a load's worth of water go for several loads. The water in her kitchen sink came from two spigots in the wall under the window--a regular one for cold water and one that looked like a garden hose connection for the hot water. That was because she used a garden hose to snake across the kitchen floor and out the door to her washer when she wanted to wash whites. She'd glug in the bleach while the washer filled, shake in some detergent and set to it. When she was done with her wash, she'd pin it out on wire lines that zigzagged across her backyard. I remember the nice bleachy smell on the back porch and the white kitchen towels flapping in the breeze.

My clothes got the bleach and cold water treatment in a high-tech Kenmore Elite washing machine. But the line drying--it still works the same as it did for my grandmother.

The $100 car

In my post below I alluded to dh's $100 car. When I met him 11 years ago, he was driving a Chevy Corsica missing all its hubcaps. He'd purchased it from a junk yard, swapped out a few parts and had a running car he could afford. His finances were very, very tight in those days. A few months after we married, something went wrong with the car and he gathered his resources and had it fixed. Literally on the way home from the repair shop, the car threw a rod. I don't actually know what that means, but I do know it is a catastrophic problem and the engine was toast. What to do? Work was over ten miles away and he had no car. I had $100 and told him he could have it if he could get a car for that. He was pretty determined because he had to have transportation, so we went into Twin Falls to look. After a bit of looking at a couple of places, he came around to the passenger side window and asked me if I really did have the $100 on me because he had found a $100 car.

And what a car it was! It was a dented 1988 Pontiac J100, a big four-door sedan with an overflowing ashtray. It smelled like death with all those cigarette butts spilling out of the tray. It needed a water pump and all the tires were flat. He ended up paying $114 with the tax and whatever else the dealer tacked on, then we took my car over to Napa Auto to get the water pump. Dh changed out the water pump right there in the used car dealer's parking lot, then took the tires off the car, put them in my van and took them down to a gas station to pump them up. He reinstalled them and drove his "new" car home.

In a few months finances were a tad better and he found another car and sold the $100 car for $500. My grandmother always liked this story because it told her just how resourceful my dh was and is.

By the way, my brother is still driving my grandmother's '83 Buick she left him when she died seven years ago.

Cars

I had my car detailed this week and picked it up today. I've never had that done professionally before, but it was a bonus that came with something, so why not? It's amazing how having the car sparkling clean changed my impression of it. It's a nine year old basic Ford Windstar. Very, very low on the excitement scale. Oh, the two carseats and the booster don't add to the sexiness of it either. :-) Wouldn't trade those for anything though. I'm proud to have them strapped into my car.

Anyway, it looks so nice it almost feels new. And new is something I probably won't ever feel again when it comes to cars. My plan is to drive this van until my youngest is eight years old and can probably get out of a carseat/booster. That is a little over three years. Even though I've been driving a minivan for literally 20 years (well, two of them), the thought of trying to put three children into carseats in a sedan leaves me cold. So I'll keep the van until they are out of those seats. In the meantime, I'm saving for a new-to-me car. I want a Honda or Toyota four door sedan. I know, I know, another car low on the excitement scale, but that's what I want. That '79 Corvette will have to wait until I don't need more than two seats. That will be in, oh, about thirteen years, LOL!

Dh drives a Chevy Suburban, 12 years old. It's good for towing, hauling lots of tools, and lots of children as it is a nine-seater. We bought it used last year. The only bad thing about it, other than the awful mileage, is that the former owner had it in Phoenix and put really dark tinting on the windows. It is actually unsafe as it seriously impedes the view out, especially at night. Downright dangerous then. Dh is going to have the tinting removed from the windows this week. It's kind of depressing to sit in the rear of the car because it is so dark there. The kids won't know what hit them when the sun comes a-shinin' in!

I've driven two vehicles in the last twenty years. Dh has driven seven in the ten years we've been married, including the $100 car. But that's a story for another day.

Syncing

I used to think I was pretty technologically savvy, but I'm afraid as I've gotten older I haven't kept up with technological advances. I think MP3 players are a spiffy invention and I use mine almost every time I go out walking. But!!! Loading and unloading it is a pain in the neck for me. The concept is very simple, but either I'm a nut or the software I use is painfully user-unfriendly. Could be either one. I found out the software that came with my MP3 player (Samsung) is woefully inadequate. After trying different players, I have found Windows Media Player to be the best one for me. I have ten CDs I'm trying to download onto my MP3 player. It took me about an hour to download all ten to my computer and now I'm sending them to my device. V-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y. I can see I'm going to have to leave my computer on all night so it can work while I sleep. I have only 1 gig, but I hope I can get it all on there. If not I'll put the first six (an audio book), then the second four (another book).

Then I have to get outside and walk my . . . um . . . tootsies off so I can listen to the stories. If I get it all to work I'll list the books I finish in the "Books I've Read" list. Hint: Newbery

Such bad news from a friend

So sad. Every week I volunteer at the local elementary school library. The librarian was tearful today and I asked her if she was sad today. She said yes, and this is the story she told me: a year ago her seven year old granddaughter complained about a hurting leg and had multiple visits to the hospital to check it out. Some minor treatment ensued, but they couldn't see anything really problematic and didn't want to do a CAT scan because it would expose her to more radiation than they wanted to expose a little girl to.

At Christmas 2008 her mom finally convinced the doctors to do a CAT scan and it revealed cancer. Worse, they discovered it has spread to many places in her little body. She started chemo yesterday and is terribly sick. Her name is Kaela and her family would appreciate prayers being sent her way for healing, and comfort for her mother Tanya.

I think this kind of situation strikes fear deep into every parent's heart. ANY parent could have this happen. How do we as parents know when to heal an "owie" with a kiss and a hug and when to rush in for the best medical care available? As a mother this is my worst fear--something serious is wrong with my child and I don't know it until the situation is advanced.

I'm going to be one of "those" grandmas :-)

You know, the ones who are always trying to get you to look at pictures of their fabulous grandchildren, LOL. I like this modern version of the wallet full of pictures because this way anyone can choose to look or not and I'll never know! Although my map does show quite a few visitors from Seoul. (To my Korean friends: that last sentence was a fragment and not a full sentence, but I know you know that ;-) )

Holly came by last night to show the baby to his grandpa and three aunts. They were all properly impressed at his cuteness.

Look at the lovely afghan. My mother crocheted it for Zachariah (that's what Holly is calling him these days) and it is done in my absolute favorite denim blue colors. I wish I had one big enough to wrap myself up in, I like it so much.