Daily Ooos: Monday, January 3

[faerywings]

OK, ladies!! Let's do this! New year, New week, New Start!

I got my 2022 planner open and the To-Do list has been started. I had one week of preholiday insanity and one week of - well, grief. Now I am ready to move ahead and do what I have to do. When Caitlyn and I do puzzles together, we say that we have to beat the puzzle. It becomes a battle and we don't give up. (Aside from one puzzle that was *impossible*- you might remember me complaining about it- the Bermuda puzzle. But we have a good track record of beating them.) Anyway, that is the mentality that I am bringing to my day. Gonna beat the day and all of the chaos it wants to throw at me.

I guess that the Bermuda puzzle is also a lesson to keep in mind. That in spite of a really good track record, there are going to be days that I will try to succeed and will eventually need to cut my losses if that proves impossible.
I should write a book: How to Attack Life and Puzzles: A Memoir


My biggest chore today is the food shopping order. I tried to work on it yesterday but you had to wait to be allowed into the website and then it kept crashing once you were in. It is back to everyone trying to do online shopping again. *eye roll* Don't get me wrong, I am glad that we have that as an option. I simply thought that two years later it wouldn't still be an issue.

I am almost caught up with laundry, Scott gave me a lot of help with that yesterday. And I scrapped a page- my first "real" one in three weeks! The calendar pages got posted but they weren't my photos and were from a template. I think each of them had three/four layers. Not much in the way of actual scrapping.

That is about it from me, I hope that you have a wonderful day!

 

[LSlycord]

Good morning. It's cold here this morning. Ok, for most of you, I guess that my 55* is not cold but for me it is. But it is sunny and the fire pit is going full blast. I'm in my hoodie and jeans...which doesn't happen too often here.

@faerywings love your new year attitude. My friend is still here. Don't know if we will do anything today or not. We mainly play it by ear. Kids don't go back to school until Wednesday. Im going to try to get another challenge done today. And maybe start looking at the job boards a bit. While I have enjoyed the time off, after a month I am certain that I'm not ready to be done with working permanently.

I'll try to stop back in later.

 

[faerywings]

Braxton's new family

@Cherylndesigns Caitlyn has been getting Gray skeletons of people and animals for years, we have dogs, rats, bats- but this is a first, having a two-headed human and a Cerebus
It still feels weird thinking that other people have different time zones that "count." haha! North NJ thinks it is just an expansion of NYC in a lot of ways so I guess we are NYC-centric as well. We should be more humble
.......naaaahhhhhhhh.............

@tanteva ugh about your computer, did you get a Windows update? I got that yesterday and it wanted me to change all of my settings to Microsoft. Uhm- NO. Sorry that you had to deal with your phone, hope the computer is back up and running well today.
The crochet pattern is just a diagram, no words? I tried to use one once when I couldn't figure out how to read a "phrase" in a pattern and I think it made me more confused. But if anyone can figure it out, I am sure that it is you.

@BrightEyes Our temps dropped so much overnight but not as bad as by you and thankfully, no wind ATM.
OMG- the poor people on the gondolas! I would have been hysterical, not from the height (although that wouldn't be fun) but from the cold. I am glad that they were all able to get down ok.
Hope that today is warmer and less windy. If not, I know that you will have lots of stuff to keep you busy inside.

@Kythe how awesome to see you back here again! How kind of you to make sure that the hummingbirds have warm enough food. I know that Rae and Trudy do the same.
Any chance you have the corn chowder recipe saved on your computer? I would love to try that if it is easy to convert to vegetarian.
Good luck with the snow, stay warm!

@bcgal00 The cold weather can't be helping your back at all. That is sweet of Jen to come by with Bella, bet Taz and Remi are happy to have company. How did you sleep last night, any better?
Thanks for the info on Sweet Tooth. I am not sure if Gary would enjoy it but will keep it in mind when we run out of shows to watch which will be soon.

Cheryl- oh wow, those photos are stunning! Have fun with Ava when you go back to explore-- from the *outside* of the fence

@tjscraps Good luck going back to work today.
You are bonkers- outside in the cold like that?? Even if you are around a firepit, it is still in the negatives! Brrrrrr!
I am shivering just thinking about it. But it had to be nice to get outside, I guess you do it when you can.

@mom2triplets04 I would never think about making stuffed shells in an Instapot. I wish I had room in my kitchen for one.
Are you going to get hit by the storm today? I am so happy that we are out of range. Usually, when NJ gets snow, my area gets more than the rest of the state. Hope you are able to stay warm and cozy

Hugs and love to you all!

 

[tanteva]

I'm not in a good mood today. Nothing serious, I'm just totally unmotivated, I want to create, but everything looks like it's done by a 5 year old. At least, I've got some cleaning/decluttering/organizing done. It's really great, I've gotten Urban on the train, and we are both sorting stuff. No stress, baby steps. I think it's great that we both do this, and that we agree that we have lots of time. This is our project for 2022. Like, we have this shelf that really could use some organizing, and we said we should do that together. But then we realized that much of the stuff there (gardening stuff), need to go down to the garage (we have an extra garage at the end of the yard, that we only use to store stuff - we have a car port for the car) ... and we cannot get there. It's too much snow, and we're NOT shoveling a way to get there. No way! The shelf will have to wait for spring. It's not like we lack other things to sort.

Also, I prepared Urban (he hates changes LOL), that when we've decluttered, and stuff is in better order, I want to do some moving around. We have our bed room upstairs, and I want to move it downstairs. Let's face it - we're not getting any younger. I don't have a real plan yet, but now I've planted the thought in Urban's head. I'm sure he can help me decide what rooms to switch. We've lived in the house in 12 years now, and never done any changes.

@faerywings The pattern book has both diagram and text. Problem is - the text is Japanease LOL. But I think I understand the diagrams, and there are photos of the finished square, that helps too. There are 200 flower motif squares, and I'm going to do one of each. Then there are 4 squares that are "plain" - i.e. no flower motif, but kinda fancier granny squares made in one color. Plan is that I will do 1 flower square every day and when I have time one in solid color. I know I won't be doing it every day, there will be work & other things that happens. but I want to have tons of squares to join by December. Not even sure what I will do. It's just fun to do squares. LOL

Now, time to make dinner. I've made a pizza dough, and will try and make a pizza bianca from what I have at home. Which will be kind of a challenge, cuz I've never made on before & I have no really good cheese at home. LOL Sometimes my brain gives me weird ideas!

 

[taxed4ever]

Morning everyone and Happy Monday!! A new start and now I must think of a new motivational word to go along with this New Year. I will have to put my thinking cap on for that one. I have made one goal for myself and for my DH and that is to get back to doing real Keto and lose some of this Covid weight that we have both put on. I know that my Gary needs to lose at least 60lbs and needs to be more active, not that he doesn't keep us both busy when he is home LOL. Just needs to be more physically active. His knees are really bothering him, (he would never say so though). I am sure that taking off some weight will make his knees happier at least until he can get into the hospital to have them replaced. He is avoiding that like the plague (no pun intended). Does not want to be in the hospital during these uncertain times. Can't say as I blame him! Our hiking group has decided not to do any hikes during January with the numbers steadily increasing and the fact that you do not need to fully vaccinated to join our hiking group. (that was news to me). I am pretty sure that everyone was fully vaxed, but you never know right? DH and I made our appt to get our booster yesterday, so that will happen on the 21st of this month. My sister Pam has been sick throughout the entire Christmas Season and still has not gotten a Covid test. Grrrr!!! Glad we haven't been in contact with her for quite awhile. She worked in the hospital lab for years before she retired, she should know better!! My sister Wendy's birthday is tomorrow and now the three of us won't be able to celebrate her birthday together. I still don't have a gift or a card for her, so I need to get busy with doing that. I will go for a quick birthday visit with her on Wednesday as that is her day off. Yesterday we spent the entire day getting the house Un-Christmased (I know that's really not a word lol). It was a big job, but happy to have it done. I have way too much Christmas stuff!! Today DH is home as this is a holiday day for him. We will be bottling a nice white wine and then put all the containers into the dreaded crawl space. So that will be my exciting day, hopefully I will get a page done for one of the challenges today and get back to scrapping a lot more.

@faerywings - I love your fresh new attitude for 2022, along with your new daily planner for this year! I need to make one of those for myself! I am finding that I really need to make more notes to myself, perhaps it will keep from flitting back and forth from one thing to another? OMG you two headed skeleton is crazy!! You will soon need a larger house to accommodate all this extra family! I have noticed it to be harder to do my online grocery shopping also, guess everyone is getting back to doing it again with the bad weather and of course the Covid numbers rising. I wonder if the pool will go back to booking swim times again? I have not felt comfortable about going back to swimming with so many in the pool and the change rooms.

@LSlycord - Wish we had your temps!! However it has warmed up a bit here and we are now getting a ton of rain. The snow will soon all be gone and we will be back to slushy yucky roads! Oh well its nicer to drive in than a ton of snow! Nice that you still have your friend there with you! Hope you both find something fun to do today! Really you are not ready to retire yet?? I do not miss working one little bit LOL.

@tanteva - Sorry that you are not in the best mood today! Hope your creative mojo comes back to you soon! Nice that you and Urban are on the same page about de-cluttering etc. It will be a great job for you to do together! I love the feeling of having a de-cluttered organized home!

Ok I need another coffee and then will open my photoshop and see what happens! Hopefully my Gary will not find another job for us to do before I get started! Have a lovely Monday everyone!

 

[mom2triplets04]

Checking in. It's been a rough morning. My husky puppy 8 months keeps attacking her harness. She has destroyed 3 in 3 days. So now we are taking the harness off when she comes in but when she needs to go out it is a major battle to get the stupid thing on her. I fought with her twice this morning. I gave up and wound up using her collar so she could pee but it was a battle to get her to come inside. It's 28 degrees out there. Luckily no snow @faerywings. Dog is now sleeping finally and it's 1 pm. I did manage to get my bible reading done. Haven't had lunch yet so I'm going to do that now.

Kids went to school. I had a rough night waking up every hour or so waiting for the phone call telling us it would be remote but no phone call came. Most of the schools around me are remote but not ours. My daughter said that she had 10 people absent in her first period class. They are offering covid testing today and wed. My daughter wants to be tested even though she has no symptoms. My hubby and her are both hypochondiacs. It drives me crazy. Why would you stand in line with people who are sick because you think you have it yet you have no symptoms. What ever happened to a cold? No one ever has a cold. now? It's always covid? Sorry for my venting.


Dinner - made this before and it was good. Going to make rice and green bean salad (new recipe)

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/279293614382999185/

and this which will leave out the mushrooms as no one eats it except for me so I didn't buy the mushrooms

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/279293614383012557/

Well, I must go eat lunch. Hoping the rest of the day is better with the dog.

 

[bcgal00]

Good morning ladies. I'm a bit better this morning. I'll be wearing the back brace for the next wk or so but don't mind it, it's like wearing a girdle, holds everything in D took down the tree this morning for me so the house is back to normal. He's thinking of projects to do now that he is retired. The first one will be building a frame to put my shoe rack into (don't ask, I have a lot of shoes LOL). The rack is big and is starting to tilt with the weight of many shoes so a frame that will hold it stable will be great and shouldn't be a hard project for D to do. Next I want him to fix a shelf in a dining room cabinet that split. He's doing more in the kitchen too, loading and unloading the dishwasher. I'll keep doing the food stuff - prepping and cooking. It is nice to have him around to do more chores. He says he feels great, knowing that he has so much more time now to do everything, nothing has to be rushed or done all at once. What a great feeling that must be. I know that I'll retire before Xmas this year but still not sure when. Definitely want to give it some time, see how finances are once D's work pension kicks in and we know exactly what we're working with.

We caught up on L&O SVU last night. I love that show, especially the character Oliiva. We also caught up on The Good Doctor too. Tonight might be NCIS LA or Roswell New Mexico. We've got at least 6-7 episodes of each.

Like Trudy @taxed4ever , I've got some COVID weight to lose and with my back problem, that is not a good thing so today I started back on my WW app, cutting out all junk foods and desserts aside from fruit and will get back to eating half my plate as salad again. It won't take long to lose the weight but its the initial couple of wks as I get back into the mindset that is hard, it's so easy to self-sabotage. But straining my back this last wk has been a big reminder that I must put my health first. I'll be making up a meal plan for the next couple of wks. Dinner tonight will be black beans, rice, cauli rice, broccoli and an oil-free sauce with a green salad with oil-free vinaigrette. Trudy - good for you for getting back on track with your keto. Let's hope we both lose this COVID weight. My Jen is also back on keto starting today. She ate anything she wanted over the holidays so is going to focus on healthy eating again.

@mom2triplets04 What kind of harness do you use? Is it one you slip over her head? A good trick to getting them to not mind getting the harness on is to hold harness in front of her head, as you face her, hold a treat, putting your hand thru the head opening of the harness and touch her mouth, letting her eat the treat. Hold a few little treats in your hand and continue to feed her the little bits of treat as you move the harness (with your other hand) down your wrist, over your hand, her face and then its on her neck. Give her a few more treats as you complete the harness clips on the side. Make sense? Remi hated the harness but it only took a few times of giving the treats to calm her down and slide the harness over her head to get her used to being calm when I did it. I continued giving the treats for a few wks until it became a conditioned response, to be calm and stand still as I put the harness on, then I didn't need to give them anymore. Hope this idea helps.

@faerywings Good luck shopping today. I was going to order groceries online too but since I'll be going out for my booster shot on Wed, I'll have D stop at the store on the way back and he can shop while I point out what we need.

My back is slowly getting better. No painkillers today, just anti-inflammatory, the brace and then lying down with heat pad here and there. I'm glad this is improving so well, that sudden strain scared me, reminded me of how back it can get. I'm going to start weight lifting next wk but will wait until this strain fully subsides.

I'm going to look at challenges today, maybe do some scrapping later. I'll do a bit of desk work today so it'll lessen my load for tomorrow b/c we'll be back to a full schedule again.

 

[Cherylndesigns]

Well, I finally made it. It's warming up a bit - 45 right now. It's going to warm up again soon. I've had constant people here and just now made it on here.

We took our tree down!!! It looks so nice in the living room now. I love the tree up but it DOES make our space look smaller. Daisy is SO excited - she can look out of that window now. What a job though! I'm re-boxing all of my stuff and Chuck asked me if I cared if he threw the tree away. We've had it forever and it was in a box for 2 years and most of the lights don't work. So, Braden's coming to get it later. It's sitting out in our driveway. LMBO Ava came down and said "what's your Christmas tree doing laying outside?" So, we'll get a new one next year. Poor guy had to rig so many lights on it this year - it WAS pre lit but half the lights didn't work anymore, so it was a conglomeration.

Chris @faerywings what a cute picture of your skeletons and friends. So, I know you didn't think it was weird that I'm getting a cow skull. BWAHAHA I can't wait to get it - I'll have to keep on Ava's BF to get it done. He gave me the coolest river reeds the other night and I had the perfect tall vase to put them in. He's going to get me some bamboo too. That guy is out in the wild constantly and he already got me some awesome pieces of driftwood that are out in my front garden. Glad you liked my night pics. It's kind of hard to get good ones with the headlights. Haha I thought they looked pretty cool tho.

LOVE your new attitude for 2022. Now let's see if it's contagious. So many people have gotten that Covid - Trudy @taxed4ever it's probably a good idea to stop all those activities. So many people getting it that have been vaxxed and boosted. Well, so much for those. My sister has it and she wasn't boosted, but double vaxxed. She's really sick, I guess and Steph's bff is triple vaxxed and she has it.

Eva @tanteva sorry you're not feeling well (mentally). I really don't either and I look at all this Christmas mess and just want to throw my hands up. It's not helping. Adrienne's going to come get our boxes as soon as we tape them up and write on them. I'm SO thrilled that all of my stuff will be accessible from now on.

Well, hugs to everybody - stay warm if it's cold where you are - Linda @slkendall my dd lives in Ft. Myers and it's only 68 there! Everybody - stay healthy - more than stay warm. I'm staying away from anybody I don't know as much as I can.

 

[Kythe]

@faerywings lol Corn Chowder is really easy. I use chicken stock as a base or make a stock from a ham bone but I would think a vegetable stock would work. It would just have more of a tomato flavour. 1/12cups stock, 1 can kernel corn or 1 1/2 cups frozen corn, 1 can creamed corn, 1/2 finely chopped onion, 1 stalk celery finely chopped. carrots (however many you like) chopped , hash browns or 1 chopped potato, 1/2 bell pepper and any other veggie you have, milk or cream to taste. For non vegetarian people I cube cooked ham or sometimes a smokie if I want a little more spice.

Can you tell this is a throw it in kinda soup? I use up my leftovers this way.
Cook the raw veg in the stock, when soft add the corn and any other cooked veg you have. Simmer. Just before serving add milk or cream and simmer. Season as desired. I usually just use salt and pepper but sometimes I add a wee bit of curry. Sometimes I even add leftover gravy . That is the base. I never make it the same twice. . lol but it always tastes great.

We started to take down the Christmas lights today and got so cold we called it quits after 20 minutes. I think the 'de-Christmasing' will take the whole month at this rate.

I have spent the last 2 days constructing a model farm house with 'settin' on porch for the train set we put under the Christmas tree. It will go down the way from the train station and the hardware store and beside the other house I have. If I have time before the tree goes away I will take a few photos to scrap.

 

[BrightEyes]

I dashed in here this AM for a quick peek but didn't take time to post. Been busy all day since then. Trying to get caught up on some CT stuff at a few sites plus checking on the Border Challenge I am hosting here. Then had a few business things to get done which took more time than I expected (as usual lately it seems). Decided that I would go ahead and get a start on the book inventory. I was going to just write down the books in the 2 double-bookcases in the living room and dining room as they are mostly hard backs. When I took a good look at what was there, I knew I really needed to get rid of a few of them as I don't think I will ever re-read them. Some of them are from back in the mid-50s-70's that are not really what I want to keep. And.. I found I already had 2 HBs of 2 softbacks just I got a couple months ago plus 2 HBs of the same book - both in the SAME bookcase! LOL Guess I will discover even more duplicate copies as I winnow through the books. Well..... 5 grocery sacks full of books later! ! ! ! I was at least smart enough to get the old paper inventory book out and mark the ones I pulled off the shelves to give away. Then of course, I had to decide what books to move into the empty spots in those bookcases. I was exhausted by then so quit to fix supper. I can tell dealing with books will be a long on-going project for the next few months. Of course... the problem with looking at the books.. is I see some that makes me want to read them NOW! But so far, I am staying strong and sticking with the series I am already re-reading.... 'The Last Victim', 'The Last Kiss Goodbye', 'Her Last Whisper', and 'The Last Time I Saw Her' by Karen Roberts. If you like a bit of ESP plus ghosts and romance... you might like them.

Too tired for personals - heading for bed in a few. Hope everyone has a good night's sleep.

 

[tjscraps]

View attachment 363673
Braxton's new family


@tjscraps Good luck going back to work today.
You are bonkers- outside in the cold like that?? Even if you are around a firepit, it is still in the negatives! Brrrrrr!
I am shivering just thinking about it. But it had to be nice to get outside, I guess you do it when you can.

Hahahha - it was really nice actually to get some fresh air. We lasted about 5 hours out there before the sun went down and it got too cold.

I love your pics of Braxton, you're a hoot!!!