Ordinary in the daily routine

During this Covid-19, stay at home, not out of Phase 0, life feeling a touch mundane, finding the Joy. Here is what it looks like:

• seeing my neighbors more frequently.  We meet, on our joined driveway, from a safe distance, for an hour every Friday. This week will be #11.  We've talked about continuing even when the crisis is over.
• Simon has been working at a grocery store for a long while now.  It seemed like he was only getting one 4 hour shift a week.  When busy with college and other activities, that was ok.  He looked for another job, but those were few and far between.  With this pandemic, he has been getting a lot more hours.  Now we happy he didn't find a new job, he might have been laid off. 
• With some birthday money, I bought some journalling stencils.  Been using them in my store bought planner, to make bullet marks; helpful to me for checking things off or highlighting if I didn't get it done.  I have added washi tape, in the back, to designate certain pages as different pages.  Added ribbons, just today, to paper clips, to make it easier to find certain pages, other than the tabbed month.  Yeah, I am a bit geeked out and getting more organized.
• the end of 2019/2020 school year is just days away.  Several subjects have been completed already.  Managed to finalize those grades, package up the work, and get it into long term storage.  Excited by this, because I have been trying to stay on top of the grading all year and it has paid off.
• in our neck of the woods, it is starting to warm up.  Think I have figured out the strategic placing of fans, so that we can keep the A/C off.  Have no firm facts, but seems like a few fans running, certain curtains closed, unnecessary lights off, would be cheaper than running A/C, curtains open and random lights on (a habit I am trying to break).  There is a touch of joy in this for  me.
• last but not least, guys who are content with simple meals and ones they can fix on their own.

What brings you Joy?

Beauty in a Thursday

This butterfly bush almost died.
Managed to save it, winter it indoors,
and safely transpant outside.

Beauty!  Not the Vogue or GQ Magazine type either.  Genuine, from the soul, kind of beauty.  The kind that don't fade, but go brighter as time marches on.  Beauty in friendship, beauty in nature, beauty in routine.  That was the sum of today's experience.  Beauty in in all.

• cool weather
• getting back into a local co-op
• son feeling better
• walks with Kevin
• butterfly bush growing well
• connecting with new friends (lol!  another Jennifer)

What has caught your eye as beautiful?  Simple things, big things, little things?  Care to share?

No complaints!

Homebody kind of day today!  Everyone seemed to sleep in.  Bed time couldn't get here fast enough.  In all things, finding joy.

• rained pretty much all day
• minimal trips out
• grilled cheese and tomato soup kinda day
• half way through August on sky scarf

Where Did Yesterday Go?

Wowzers!  70 degrees and sunshine yesterday.  Cloudy, windy, and cold today.  Snow predicted didn't come till much later than anticipated, but still came in.  So many good things today, here it goes:

• only 7 more weeks, in braces, for Ian
• hearing "It's snowing"
• open mouth, waiting for snowflakes
• date with Kevin
• still reaching 10,000, after long day
• driving snow
• Owl Moon

Warm Weather . . . .

 while waiting for snow.  Seen the possiblity for Winter weather on Thursday!  Truly hope it is for "real"!  We are due and we are ready.  In the mean time, has been nice to air out the house, get the plants out on the deck for a bit of time, dog sunning outside.

• warm weather
• slow morning
• supplies for crafting magnets
• candles, both real (soy based) and battery operated
• overall good feeling all day long
• pulling out the duct tape

 Pink Duct Tape  to mend a school folder.

Yes, it might be cheapr to use new one, but the

tape adds a pop of color!

Plant in green pot is a butterfly bush I saved and bringing

back to life.  Hope it will grow rather large over the spring and summer.

In the plan pot are clover and in the blue is my Rosemary bush.

Snow! And it was pretty!

We got measurable snow overnight; albeit, not a whole lot, couple inches or so.  Out the back of our house it looked beautiful.  The house backs up to acres of park land.  At times, would be nice if it were our land, but other times it is nice that it belongs to someone else.

• measurable snow
• wood brought it for a fire
• clear roads
• ideas for warm dinner
• thankful for days end

 Backyard, early morning.

 Just before a good shake.

 The colors are cool looking!

This was called, "Melty Dog".

With a good fire going, room can get well above

80 degrees.

What is blue and yellow?

The sky!!!!!!!!!!  At least for a portion of the day.  It did get gray during the middle of the afternoon but cleared up to show off a beautiful sunset.  Felt good to see the sky.

Thanksgivingn for the day:

• sunshine
• longer walk with Charlotte
• naps
• good dinner
• beautiful sunset

Know I promised the sky scarf today.  I wasn't able to fully catch up and decided to rip it out and start again.  Weaving the yarn, up the side, is a new skill for me and I'm trying to get it looking nice.  Soon is all I can promise at this point.

A Blustery Day!

A blustery and rainy day.  Windy enough to move the outside furniture or knock them over.  We survived.  Looked forward to around dinner time when we start closing up the curtains for the day; wanted an end to the cold, rain, and dark.

• wind moving the storm away
• socks
• music
• falling asleep to Screwtape Letters
• new recipe for dinner
• working on sky scarf

Maybe tomorrow I'll have a progress photo of the scarf!  I can dare to dream.

As a total side note, the slowness of the day and lack of weekly meal planning meant last minute thawing of meat.  Have found that once the meat is a little thawed, it can be cut down into smaller chunks, which cooks and breaks up easily.  Cooking save & kitchen hack!

No Picture Kind of Day

it is just that kind of day.  Beautiful sunshine, check; breeze, check; bees buzzing, check; smells of summer, check; vitamin D catching sort of day; just no pictures.  It was a day to push through and get the basics accomplished ~ a day when long naps or vegging outside would be wonderful.

Very thankful to have had another day, even when doing life while exhausted.  Thankful to be bringing it to a close.  Thankful for adult conversations.  Thankful for hearing others speak well of our boys.  Thankful for cold, crisp apples.

And with that, I wish you a good night!

P.S.
I was reminded this morning (Wednesday should you care), that yesterday, while fixing my much needed afternoon coffee, I was truly thankful for the one filter left.  I was exhausted enough that retrieving then next bundle from the top pantry shelf, felt like a huge ordeal!  I snicker now, but it did really feel like to much work.

Back to Sunday . . .

. . . in this stretch of blogging.  Last Sunday mulled over how I might keep thing interesting here.  One was sharing my knitting.  My latest idea, which I haven't followed up on, is the Sky Scarf.  Still looking into it; will follow through, but kinda thankful I haven't started just yet.  We're in unusual raining season ~ that scarf would have a lot of gray!  :)

The knitting of the day has been plugging away at this "Three Way Wrap" I found over at Raverly.  I am actually ripping out a sweater I knit about 8 years ago and had worn once in that time.  I just didn't like it, at all.  The color and yarn are fine, just the style of sweater, for me, was all wrong.  Hoping this will be a better thing for me.  Wanted something easy to make and didn't want to spend money on it.

Here's what I have so far:

sorry about the blurry spot at the bottom
need to clean the lense well!

It is 33 inches long, so I have another 24" to go according to the directions.  Think I have enough yarn, hope so anyway.  Haven't settled on buttons yet, but have some time.

Most of today has been pretty good.  Seeing friends, going to church, baking banana bread, making meatballs, and a lot of knitting.  Run down of the joy would be:

• catching up with a "kindered sole"
• seeing glimmers of our kids totally happy and content
• spending time in the kitchen
• smells of homemade banana bread and meatballs (but not at the same time)
• lazy dinner because my energy was spent on the above
• playing in water while it rained
• lots of time knitting
• watching "This Old House" and "Ask This Old House" with our oldest, reminds me of times with my dad
• making time to blog, today it feels good ~ not a chore
• an audio book comes coming, through local library (get to add to the reading tab here)

What has brought you joy lately?  Time alone?  Time with friends?  Crafts?  Share your joy!!!!!!!!!!

Opposite Day

2:00 PM brings:

That is what today can be summed up as.  Whatever yesterday was, today is the opposite; in almost every measure, except the actual digits for the temperature (it's gone down, unfortunately).  We're back to having rain, personalities are clashing, things are forgotten, difficult to muster through the tasks of the day, and on and on it goes.

Goodness, thankfulness, joy filled moments ~ I need to pause and reflect.  It's been that sort of day.  How to keep count of the good when life is feeling hard?  Start small I suppose!  Plenty of coffee and ice for my favorite caffienated beverage.  Dry spots to get out of the rain, that would be two.  Warm, fuzzy socks beckoning to the cold feet.

Not sure if this is getting easier, but it's a start.  And this particular post may end up being written in multiple sittings.  It's that kind of day.  My attention being pulled in multiple directions.  Kids needing something, dog needing to be walked, dishwasher needing unloading, computer work needing to be done.  You get the idea.  For now, I save what's written to move onto the events of the day.  More to write later.

11:08 PM day gone sideways
Yup, it went sideways!  The whole day ~ sideways.

Rainy days need colorful umbrellas!

Happy Places

What's your happy place?  Where do you go to unwind? To recharge?

Is it a library or book store or a run?  Maybe some place loud because you're an extrovert and need that to recharge!

Life has been wet, to say the least, around my parts of the world.  Heard some folks compare our area to Seattle, Washington because we'd had rain everyday for over two weeks.  Thankful for the rain, as we didn't have to water the new grass, but it does get old after awhile.  Yesterday and today have been gloriously sunny, mild temps, and cool breezes.  This led to finally planting a garden.  For me, that is a happy place.  Sun, breeze, dirt, plants, digging, things to add to the soil so the plants get "good" fertilizer (I added bananas for the potassium, egg shells for the calcium, and Epsom Salt for the magnesium, plus some sand to help loosen up the clay).  It felt wonderful to play in the dirt!

 Two tomato plants and a grape tomate plant!

 Planted beens this year!  A new thing for us to try.

I'll put some twine around the poles and weave the plants through

as they grow.

Three baskets with potato seeds in them.  Found

the idea on Pinterest.  The little plants, to the right of

the laundry baskets, are basil.  Second round unfortunately;

weather has been so unpredictable, we've lost a few things already.

And back to counting the joy:

• warm, dry weather (with a breeze even)
• planting our garden
• final weeks of the school year
• coffee
• getting a computer back

Crazy, Random, Rapid Fire!

That is what it has felt like for blog posts the last few days.  Coming quicker than I can jot a note or take a photo.  Before I know it the day is done, lights out, sleep overcomes, and a new day is fast approaching.

I have been mulling over expanding on this blog.  Not just the joy in life, but occasional other posts such as:  books read (at the end of the month), Simple Woman's Day book (I think that is what is called, need to look it up, but internet is slow today), possible just photo days with minimal words explaining it, and a few other ideas I am not ready to share.

Questions for those of you who read this:

1. is to much of the same thing bad - meaning just posting joy stuff?
2. would you want to read more variety of stuff or at least in a different format?
3. how often on blog posts?

Would love to read comments on these ideas!  Preferably here, but Facebook is fine too!  Why here?  I occasionally go back to see what folks thought and it's nice to see others input.

Here are some random things that have brought joy.  One day, I will learn to note them down, but for now these will do:

1. aches and pains subsiding
2. ladies bible studies starting again
3. fitbit challenges to keep the step count up
4. promises of Spring
5. kids maturing
6. fresh coffee
7. getting back to a regular routine
8. time for coloring
9. time to read
10. seeing kids smile
11.  sunshine
12. daffodils peaking out of the ground, way to early

 Warm weather to dry out a tent after Klondike Camping

Beautiful Sunset!

Yes, the woods are covered with snow.

Almost the end

of January!  Today, the 30th, and 31st.  Did you make any New Years Resolutions?  Have you broken any of them?

I've never been keen on making a long list of desires to accomplish.  This year, I kind of mentally decided to pick a new thing the first of every month to work on.  Would continue the ones from the previous month as well.  January, I've bitten the reading bug.  Five books since the first.  I started another and it was an utter chore to read.  As I've been getting a lot of recommendations, I scrapped number 5 and moved to 6.  Here is what I've read so far:

1. Wonder
2. Book Thief
3. The Giver
4. The Snow Child
5. Walking by Thoreau (book I scrapped)
6. Counting by 7s

So far I have enjoyed all but Walking so far.  Counting by 7s took a bit to get into but it did grip me about 2/3 of the way.  Probably read that far "waiting" for the "I want to see how this ends" feeling.  Still need to pick a new book, but may wait a day to catch up on other things.

As for February, I am not sure what I want to make a habit of.  It might just be a tweaking of my desire to get fit.  Bought a Fitbit a few days ago.  That has been surprisingly motivating.  Need to add strengthening to the walking and water aspect though.  Snow removal has a way of introducing muscles that haven't been used in awhile.  Will see how that goes.  But have also been mulling over more drawing, coloring, crafting and the like.  I am surprised at how much I've missed it the last few years. It had taken a back seat to life and I am enjoying the process of finding things to do, to create, and even designing things.

Guess another resolution would be to come back here, more often, to note the "Joy in the Ordinary".  Had seen something with those words on it, in December, and it stuck wit me.  Most days, I am looking for the little things and finding the joy in it.  Since the our last birthday celebration, here are some of the things that have brought joy:

This is what the sky has been like, on occasion.  Beautiful!!

• sunlight reflecting off of fresh snow
• neighbors, who pitch in to get a job done
• hot tea
• time to wander Micheal's
• friends
• reading
• not loosing electricity
• fitbit
• easy meals to prepare
• time to put feet up

What Brings Out Your Focus?

Your drive?  That "Type A" side we all have to varying degrees.

    My "A" side strikes every once in awhile, but not nearly often enough.  It's here this afternoon though.  In just a couple hours at home, alone, I'm able to get chores done in crazy time.  Though, those two hours are not enough time to get the WHOLE house done, it is just enough time for noticeable progress, and that will have to be good enough.

As is my "nature", I enjoy taking pictures of things that strike me as cool, beautiful, or unique.  I've also been know to take photos of things that tie into a blog post that is rattling around in my head.  That is what happened with today's writing and photos.

 Just warm enough for Charlotte to hang out

on the deck while I cleaned.  As I was focusing on a good

vacuuming, things got moved of the floor.  I took

her bed outside and she slept half on, half off.

 My desire for cute planner.  Making my own or finding one to down

load and print, just didn't happen.  I wanted to much out of a home made

and it was taking to long.  Store bought, with a plastic front and a place

change change out a cover, to the rescue.  Bonus ~ under $8.00.

 Must have ~ month view with just enough room to get a good over view

of what is going on that month.  Yes, April is still blank, will be updating that soon.

 Week view ~ again, enough room for all that needs to be in there.  I will still have a 

homemade school calendar (via Donna Young's website) with detailed notes on that.

I'd hate to see how big the calendar would be if I combined home and school on one calendar.

I also tied ribbons on the top spiral loop, to further personalize it and to add in finding the 

exact page I wanted.  When I do fill things in, some will be in pen, some in pencil.

I'll color code, either with highlighters or colored pencils, so a quick glance

I can see who's items are who's.

My list of joy and thankfulness (today and random last few months):

• store bought planner to personalize
• time to clean
• talent show for 5th & 6th graders
• warmth and sunshine
• boys earning their advanced red belt in TKD back in February (next belt is black)
• boys getting second stripe, yesterday (two more to go)
• breakfast for dinner

Been Awhile, but Still Thankful

Many things in life have changed since beginning this blog.  Many things I don't care to share in the open Internet.  What truly matters is finding, seeing, feeling, and believing in the joy that is around you and me.  It is there.  It always has been.  It always will be.  There are days that it is so obvious and lists grown on those days, like spring flowers.  Other days just feel dark and lonely, a desire to retreat to the dark corners exist.

I began writing, as a way to focus on the good and joyful things.  Some days were easy, many days hard.  Writing became easier as life's kinks got worked out.  During this, unfortunately, writing became one extra thing to do on a busy day's schedule and I needed to take a break.  I was, and still am, thankful for the little things in life.  The big things to.

If you are wondering why I chose to write today, there is an overwhelmingly strong feeling of being thankful today.  Probably began yesterday and continued into this morning.  Many things, that look like this:

• dog finally coming home after a 20 minute run through the woods (and yes, right before we needed to head out)
• younger son, in joyful tears, hugging our wayward dog (I forget how attached he is to Ms. Charlotte)
• friends noticing, I seem to have a happier demeanor
• another good nights sleep (still getting over a slight cold, so sleep is a wonderful thing)
• a rainy morning
• leftover soup for breakfast
• a heating pad for achy muscles
• smelly pup, curled up by my side (I probably would have missed her to, had she not come home yesterday)
• thankful that it is Friday

Will probably be trying to get back to this blog, just not daily or with such large gaps in time.  How often would you want to see it?

Anyhoot, here's one last photo, of the wayward pup:

Another Saturday, Another Party

Ian's birthday is coming up soon, so he got to claim today to have some friends over.  Was rather pleased that he kept the guest list short and the length of time short too.  Had I planned it out, there might have been more 6th graders for a longer time period.  Thankful he didn't know what I was thinking.

What I like about having people over, is that we clean and the house stays that way for a couple days anyway.  Hopefully we'll keep it "clean" longer than we did after last weekend.  heheheehe!

Thankfulness for the day:

• clean house
• pizza for dinner, again
• leftovers for another day
• time to read
• cool presents for an almost 12 yo
• time for Netflix
• warm clothes in a not so warm house (we keep the thermostat in the high 60's)
• beautiful sunset

 Sunset tonight!

Love the orange/gold, pinks, and purples!

 Birthday Card

Duct Tap Wallet kit!

A successful gift.

Nifty Star Wars Fighter

Plain and pilot not to scale.

First Snow of the Season

It never surprises the folks around here that the schools don't seem to know how to deal with snow.  It had be predicted, with a fair amount of certainty, yet schools were not delayed or canceled in our county.  That meant waits of an hour to hour and half at buss stops, busses not showing at all, kids not getting to school till noon (when they start about 8:30 to 9:00 AM).  Parents were mad and I get that.  The county messed up because "it was suppose to start at 4:00 AM but didn't, it started a bit later.  Even the government, who takes care of the roads, didn't pretreat like they have in the past.  It was a mess, because the snow did come, just a bit later than anticipated.

We stayed home and choose to not take chances on the roads, a nice treat to stay home all day on what would have been a busy day.

Thankfulness for the day:

• first snow fall (and no shovels!)
• neighbors taking care of whole pipe stem
• making chocolate syrup

 Not much, but enough to make life difficult.

 Starts of homemade chocolate syrup ~

this would be sugar, cocoa powder and pinch of salt

homemade vanilla extract for when syrup comes

off the stove top

Seasons are Changing

around here!  At least the decorations.  The leaves are falling and the evergreen wreaths are coming out.

Today + Joy = a hodge podge of a list.  So here it is:

• weather that keeps people home
• quick feeling therapy
• ending of "one" season and beginning of another
• warm breakfast on a cold day

Short and sweet list!

 Fall leaf garland that came down this morning!

Annual Christmas Wreath from

my in-laws.  Love getting this each year.

Not something I would buy for myself,

so it is appreciated!

Not an Average Monday!

Seriously not your average Monday!  Even though busy, even though scattered cloudiness, even though there was A LOT of cleaning and laundry ~ there has been a great amount of things to be thankful for; lots of great photo ops too!  Without much more idle chitter chatter, here's my list today:

• boys getting to sleep in (we're on Thanksgiving Break)
• lots of cleaning getting done
• Kevin swinging by Costco, just for cheese and wine
• good dinner (Tacos)
• beautiful sunrise
• catching a lady bug
• being able to open up the house for awhile today

 boys enjoying a morning off!

 Ms. Kitty in her favorite spot.

 Ms. C in her favorite spot!  Gave her a pillow as

the Apothecary didn't look to comfy as a head rest.

Lady Bug that flew in this morning.