Tick Tock

This title has 2 meanings for me today.  2011 is soon to be history and I am almost finished with the Hunger Games trilogy.  If you've read them, you'll get the title.   It's always hard for me to read the endings of books where I'm not sure what's going to happen.  When I was younger, I always read the last page first.  But I refrained, because I know that the ending is controversial.  Some people love it and some despise it!!  I'll find out how I feel later today. 
 

Christmas this year was a day of changes.  For the first time all the kids were not at home, which was not as traumatic as I thought it might be.  There was NO snow and it was warm enough to hang clothes out, so I did all the bedding.

Now that I think of it, it was Christmas Eve, but same weather on Christmas Day too.  Some things stayed the same.  Betsy did her usual 1000 piece puzzle in just a couple hours.  I should actually time her, because I'm always amazed by it.

We had our Christmas Eve dinner on Christmas Day because Hans had to work.  It's always a ham, but it's the side dishes that are the 'stars'.  Creamed onions, sweet potatoes (no marshmallows), green bean hot dish, lefse and an assortment of pickles!  Christmas morning is always cinnamon rolls and scotch eggs.  Sorry Molly, I did not get a picture of them.  Next year........
 

My first goal in the New Year is to pare down the Christmas decorations.  I am sending packages to the older kids with their ornaments, since I don't think I'll be driving to NV in the near future.  The expense will be worth it.  This is one of my favorites though.  It sits on the dining room table and cheers me up whenever I look at it.  The older I get, the less I want around and the less I want on me:) 

OK, one more little vignette.(sp?)  This is just an old cheapie from Kohls, but it lights up just as nice as those expensive ones.  I hope you've all had a happy and restful Christmas break and Best Wishes to you dear family and friend, (that's you Olive!) in the New Year!!

Ch-ch-ch-changes

Lot's of them too. 
First - Seven pounds dropped in a month loosely following the South Beach Diet.
Second - Motive for weight loss, a wedding in Las Vegas on 12/16, canceled.
Third - Keratoses on the head, formerly harmless, now cancerous.
Fourth - Youngest son may soon be leaving for graduate school.
Fifth - Tree seen decorated in previous post, now undecorated on bottom half thanks to 2 cats.

Number 3 isn't so serious.  Squamous cell carcinoma is fairly common in people with Northern European heritage who have been in the sun.  Very slow growing, so this is a recent change since it was looked at in June.  Vanity is my main concern because they have to do the MOHS procedure which will leave a spot where hair will not grow back and it's the top of my head.  So I'm kind of feeling sorry for myself about that.  I may be looking into scarves, headbands, etc. afterwards.  Those scarves I wrote about last spring?  Folded from corner to corner and tied under the hair, I may just be "back to the 60's"!  Stay tuned!

Artificial or Real?

This is the second year for my Christmas tree.  I guess now you know it's artificial.  When I grew up the tree was always real.  Sometime around 20 years ago we bought a big, small needled, artificial tree.  We don't have a basement, so we stored that monster under our steps.  It was quite a pain to set it up every year, but we felt justified in the fact that we were saving money.  I always missed a real tree though, so after  10 years we got rid of the sucker at a garage sale and started buying a fraser fir at the Home Depot.  We really are space challenged in our family room though, and when the tree was up you couldn't see the TV from the right end of the couch.  Last year I spied a $25 tall, skinny artificial tree at Target that seemed to say, "this is what you need".  And I bought it.  Here it is for the second year looking a little empty at the bottom, but a few gifts and dolls should fill it up nicely.