Sunday updates ...

  First this photo and update.  This is Brooke and her father, William VanDevelder, hiking in Colorado.  They are distant relatives for the postcards I blogged about [here] and [here].  It's so amazing to reconnect people to their past, letting those who were once lost live again.

  I've not been feeling well for the past two days.  Friday I had a fresh spinach salad, bacon bits, dried cranberries, and pumpkin seeds with Paul Newman's White Balsamic Vinegarette, and then later finished off the rest of the pumpkin seeds while watching a movie with Charlie  A little research has pointed the finger to the pumpkin seeds because after them I spent most of the night awake and chanting "I am not going to throw up.  I am not going to throw up."  Which worked, however, left them only one other point of exit.  Today I'm running a low fever, sipping ginger and turmeric tea, and moving slowly.  The symptoms have been decreasing since Saturday morning, but it will be a very, very long time before I eat them again, if ever.

  Here is the futon sofa I was able to get last fall.  All brown and boring.  If you look closely you can see where certain cats who need to be grateful I don't believe in declawing have been using it as a scratching post along the back of it.  Of course, they never do it when I can squirt them.

  And here it is with the remaining quilt as a cover.  I was originally planning on securing it with staples, however, decided that it would be good to occasionally toss it into the wash.  Standard sofa covers were not practical because the futon doesn't have arms, and they are thin and equally boring.  This ties the rugs and recovered dining room chairs together, and adds some color to the room.  The storage tub end and coffee tables are temporary until I can find (or make) suitable replacements in the near future.  Charlie's fuzzy blanket will be washed and stored soon, and pillow covers replaced with yellow ones.  I haven't yet figured out what to put on the wall behind it yet.

Saturday ...

 It has been a frustrating week for me work-wise.  One of my crucial software programs is not working so I've spent several 10-hour days just hanging out ~ getting paid for it ~ but feeling extremely unproductive which gives my brain far too much time to think of negatives.

  I did get the dining room chairs finished, and tomorrow will work on the sofa.

  I wasn't really thrilled with how the white flour turned out in my cookbook bookends.  I may dump it all and get some dried beans or pasta.  I also am looking into some removable wallpaper to line the back wall of the pantry to add some color and pop in there.  The jars themselves date from the mid-1950s.  A friend is sending me some of her extra cookbooks and I'm excited to see what she sends.

  Picked up an ornament for my March decor.  I've ordered a large arc floor lamp to go in the corner over the dining room table and will move the party lights to another wall.  Still debating on getting an ornament tree ... or even a real tree branch that I can put in a floor pot and hang the party lights on.  

  In other less pleasant events this past week, my ex has violated the restraining order again ~ less than a month after getting a conviction for violating it last summer.  This time he had a friend of his reach out to me in an attempt to find out where I live.  It has added to my stress levels.  Police reports were filed in two states, and I'm looking into information on whether or not I will need to file an RO here that will not give him information on where I am.  I did let the local PD know that I have a weapon and am not afraid to use it.

  Mr. Charlie has a vet appointment on Tuesday which will most likely be followed by a dental cleaning and extraction at a later date, and possibly surgery about his now-growing bump on his side.  Likely a lipoma, but it has doubled in size in the past year.

  My truck is also getting a much-needed tune-up on Wednesday.  After the long drive down here, I want to be sure it stays reliable, and a belt has been squealing lately.  She's an oldie but is paid off.  So much for buying furniture and a washer and dryer with my tax refunds this year.

  You will also start to see at the top of the page links to past travels.  I'm working with UniWorld to get information from my Danube trip in 2008 since my scrapbooks were unfortunately left behind.  I found some old travel journals and am rebuilding what I can from them, and throwing in links to some sights I've been able to find.  

  I realized that this blog may be my only legacy if something ever happens to me, and may at some point schedule a "eulogy" to be posted when I'm no longer around to push the date out.   I don't regret deleting my other two blogs from the previous 10 years.  They included so much of my ex there wasn't much point in keeping them up when I removed all of the related posts.  Even posts that weren't specifically "about" him, I was able to recall the emotion behind the words and those were about him.  I wanted a fresh start.  In spite of him raising his ugly head into the "conversation" here, I think that a healthy part of my own healing is going to come from being able to address the yellow pig in the room and the resulting PTSD from the marriage.  But not today.

Wednesday ...

  Yesterday I got one of the chairs recovered, but this morning I had to go back to the hardware store to find longer screws ... and then back again this afternoon to get a battery screwdriver and a bit to fit the screws. (3rd times the charm!).  It has become a project that I will finish on Sunday after the battery has charged.

  While I was out I stopped by the Greenbrier Christmas Depot and picked up ornaments for February, March, and April.  Pictures soon when I get the rest of my March decor out.  It feels like I came home yesterday and today with more on my dodotodo list than I left with.

  Monday night I will work on covering the sofa.  Probably another trip (or three) to the hardware store next Tuesday.

  Today, however, I was distracted by a heat-wave (woohoo!  63F!) and spent a while cleaning old birdseed off the back patio so that Charlie and I could just enjoy the fresh air.  Windows were opened, and even Gracie got a chance to roll around.    

  While I was running errands today, I stopped into a few shops on Main Street I hadn't been into before.  One of them was a "this & that" store with antiques and whatnots.  I've been looking for bookends to use for my cookbooks and found two large blue Mason canning jars dating from the mid-1950s.  

  Since my dietary choices have recently been reduced to try to keep from becoming a full-blown diabetic, I'm going to fill them with some white rice and white flour that I had already purchased, opened to put in another container, and now can't eat.  Photo soon ~ they have been washed and are drying.

  It was a shop with so much to see, that I'm sure I will go back to find more decor for the house and kitchen.  There were several paintings that I would like to have a 2nd look at, and many books and cookbooks to look through.  I did get a very large one of vegetarian recipes while I was there.

   The other shop I went into was M Shop WV with postcards and other goodies that I wish I had found last fall.  Another shop I'm sure I will visit again.  They had sweatshirts and hoodies which have become my work attire lately.

  Speaking of goodies ... This coming fall I want to bake and send German Christmas cookies from my grandmother's recipes and am going to make flavored sugars to use in the recipes.  I'm drying the rind of a blood orange right now to use, and will soon be drying lemon rind, and ordering vanilla beans.  I picked up some small glass jars to use.  

  I slowed down enough today to enjoy a fresh spinach & baby greens salad with pepitas, parmesan cheese chips, bacon, dried cranberries & sesame sticks with sun-dried tomatoes vinegarette.   

  I can't say I'm going completely vegan/vegetarian at this time, but lately, I've been dealing with side effects from changes in meds and insomnia.  Not a fun time for me.

crafty Sunday ...

Sunday was a crafty day.

 [above] A turquoise and (very tarnished) silver choker I used to wear when I was 14-15 years old.

I no longer have a choker attractive neckline.

So ...

I restrung it with some new silver(ish) spacers to make it a little longer.

I also did a trial run of one of my watercolor projects.

But really didn't like how my trees turned out, so won't share that photo, and will take lessons learned for the next one I do.