Checking in!

Sometimes it's hard to think of anything very exciting to blog about. But that's okay. Sometimes excitement isn't all it's cracked up to be!

We just had about 3-5 inches of snow. Today was bright and clear, and very cold. We just got the driveway plowed and now we're due for more snow tomorrow! Micah and family are driving to St. Cloud tomorrow, about 2-1/2 hours away, for dental appointments for four of the five kids. I'll be praying for safe travel and doing some dog sitting for the day.

I'm still reading the Moshe Dayan autobiography. I finished the Deitrich Bonhoeffer book and began the Mitford series. I've read some of these before, but just realized that this fictional town is supposed to be in North Carolina! I had imagined it to be in New England! I'll have to reimagine it now! ;)

I've been busy helping with grands, helping with AWANA, making ATCs, enjoying cozy reading weather, putting on a couple of pounds and things like that. Hey, look at this...

Well, they're upside down, but they're snowshoes I bought at a garage sale last summer. I haven't worked up the nerve to try them yet, but now would be the time! I've watched tutorials, so I should be an expert, right?

This is the view right now. Glad for the sun, but it was -25 last night.

Micah was decluttering her closets and found this little item that Adam hasn't looked at in ten years. (Yep, GM, it's a mandolin. Didn't mean to be so cryptic, lol.) I have his permission to play around with it. :) No, I've never touched one before, but nothing is impossible with YouTube!

While decluttering she also came up with a box of video games and game systems belonging to Jordan. He asked about them and so I took pics of everything and he'll decide what I should mail to him. He'll probably just sell them. He doesn't seem worried about the postal rates. That stuff must be worth more than I think!

If you dislike looking at ATCs and APCs, now's the time to flip the channel. I know I'm not doing much drawing lately. More cutting and pasting like a little kid. It's kind of fun for the moment. Well, I did do those Tomten cards. I put one in my header today because that snow was making me feel cold. You, too? So, here are my latest cards...

The Collaged House swap:

Forgive me if I've posted any of these in the past. I checked back a few days on the blog to see what I'd posted, but I may make a mistake.

For these APC swaps we decorate a whole deck of cards over a period of about a year. We do the Aces one month, Kings the next, on down the line. Sometimes we'll do two whole decks, each with a different theme. For instance, above you see two full sets of sevens, one with a bird theme and the other with a postage stamp theme. This stamp and bird themed swap has gotten a little complicated because the original host couldn't complete the swap due to family difficulties, so someone else took over and we're skipping around filling in cards where needed. I won't try to explain the details. More info than you wanted, I think!

These 7 and 8 cards will complete this swap. Like I said, it got a little out of order and some cards were lost in the process and had to be redone. Anyway, all done with that one!

The name of the swap below was "An ATCoin on an ATC with an Envelope Security Liner for a Background". How's that for a mouthful? The ATCoin is the circular piece. And, yes, we actually save the security envelope liners to use for collaging, lol. You could do any kind of theme you wanted.

I seem to have run out of new photos, so it might be a good time for a dinner break before delving back into the lives of folks in Mitford...or maybe Israel, depending on what strikes my fancy this evening.

Did anyone read this far? Congratulations!! Thanks for stopping by!
Shalom! :)

The creeping crud...

I'm feeling pretty great, but Micah's family has been sick. Headaches, sinus infection, coughs. Everyone experiencing slightly different symptoms. Hazel and Audrey had school on Thursday and Friday and both seemed well. Hopefully everyone will get better over the weekend. Poor Adam still has to go out and chop wood to stoke the outside woodstove. Such is life in the backwoods!

I've enjoyed the long Christmas vacation. Ours seems to be a little shorter than folks in other states, but then our kids don't start school until after Labor Day, so I think we shorten Christmas and Easter breaks.

Doing a lot of reading. I just finished A Light at the Window by Jan Karon. It's the second in her Mitford series. I think I'll read the whole series through while working on the two books below.

I read the Dayan autobiography in my early twenties when it first came out, and really loved it. I found this copy at the thrift store and grabbed it. He's what I would call a warrior poet. A really gifted writer. I'm reading slowly and pondering. The same with the Bonhoeffer book. I think the Mitford books will be good light reading, in contrast.

Here are a few cards I've finished lately.

A zentangle swap...

 ...and an Altered Playing Card swap. They just had to have a lady and some text on them. Let the imagination run wild.

It's dark out, but there are still lines of snowmobilers roaring by in the road ditches. Lots of folks must have taken the whole week off to go snowmobiling. I can only hear a faint whining when they pass by. We have a long driveway. Hope everyone stays safe out there!

Time for dinner, so I'll wave goodbye for now. Thanks for stopping by, and shalom to all! :)

Test drive...

Howdy! Trying out my new adapter which should allow me to upload pictures from my memory card to this new Chromebook. It's a little weird so far, and seems to be kind of slow, so I may need to be more selective in what I upload. 

Just enjoying the slow pace of Christmas "vacation" with no kids to shuttle to school. I'll see how many of my older pics I can get on here and comment on. I think I'll actually be able to mix my photos and text again! Woo hoo!

Phil the pil. Actually, one of many pileated woodpeckers who visit. 

Took these photos from my laundry room window, but this fellow is wiley. He's off like a skinned rat when he sees me, lol. 

I used to only rarely sight a pileated woodpecker. Now that they've found my feeder I see them multiple times each day. It never gets old!

This black bird was raiding my feeders. She gets out of the pasture a lot and usually just paws around in the snow looking for grass. But she also seems to like sunflower seeds.

I hope I didn't share these previously. Maybe. Oh well. These were for a "Tomten/Gnome" swap. 

And the next ATCs were for a Pick-a-Theme swap where each player requested a certain theme for their card. I just guffaw when I look at these because I can't draw a recognizable person to save my life. Which just goes to show, only God can make our face, ha ha! I'll put captions so you can see who these people are supposed to be. You won't have a clue otherwise, lol.

Queen Elizabeth and Scully and Mulder (?) from X-Files.

Miss Havisham and Frida Kahlo

This was for a one-to-one trade. I don't know why it's sideways. I couldn't figure out why I see no options for editing. Another thing to learn. I wanted this one to be below the one below. Got that? lol. But when I tried to add this caption it kept moving the picture up here. Whaaaa?

Stonehenge and ME! I look so angry! And about 20 years younger! Oh well. Good for a laugh!

It' very slow loading the pictures. I get impatient, thinking it didn't hear me, and try to reload it, which results in two or three copies coming up eventually. Sheesh. Well, I'm just glad I can get some photos up. I'm not really into the idea of looking up a Chromebook manual online and really learning how to do everything. It came with just a tiny Quick Start Guide which tells you nothing. When I pulled the adapter out of the USB port it yelled at me, "Whoa there!" And told me I needed to do something with the "files app" before I could just pull the thing out. I don't even know where that is or how to find it. I think I'll just leave the adapter in the USB port and remove the memory card. Sorry. Just mumbling to myself here. 

Sun's coming up and it's a gorgeous morning here! Last few days it's been in the 20's and 30's, which is positively balmy in these parts. 

Here's my latest read. Sideways, of course.

And, a Christmas card Hazel made for me. I asked her what the brown thing was at the top of the picture. (Why is there a cow udder up there?) She said, "Oh. That's the ceiling fan." Hee hee! Nice detail!

Another oddity. When I go to choose a photo to upload they're all mixed up. Photos from last summer mixed in with photos taken a few days ago. It's like looking through a box of old photos in no particular order. Once again, not a huge deal. It just makes me wonder...why?

We had a fun Christmas. Lots of excited grandkids opening gifts. Thatcher really enjoyed his first real Christmas. (He was only a week old last year!) Micah and I totally forgot to take pictures, ha ha! I bet we enjoyed it more without that distraction. 

I hope you all enjoyed family and fun this Christmas. My step-son Trev and his family jumped on a cruise ship and headed to the Bahamas. They're always surprising us!

Love you guys! Thanks for stopping by! Have a blessed New Year.

Shalom!

We'll have a white Christmas for sure...

After some record breaking cold weather the temps have risen a little and we're getting more snow.

Adam's been working hard keeping the outdoor wood stove going, which keeps both of our houses warm. Micah's keeping busy getting the kids back and forth to school in all kinds of weather. I'm doing my usual babysitting interspersed with reading, arting and watching other people on YouTube.

Micah's big black horse, Dachessa, keeps escaping from the pasture and appearing in my yard where she paws through the deep snow to eat the greenish grass. I guess she thinks she's a wild horse. She's easily led back to her pasture with a little grain, but they will need to do a little fence mending over the weekend. This horse gets a LOT of hay, but they probably need to get some round bales to keep her occupied.

I went out to fill one of my feeders this morning and got a photo of a chickadee and a small woodpecker from about ten feet away. Hard to see the woodpecker on the suet feeder, but he's there! The bigger pileated woodpecker ( I call him Phil) takes off like a shot if he even sees me inside the house!

Otherwise, I'm doing some ATCs for a swap. The themes were requested by other traders.

Below are photos of artwork, weather and my niece, Naomi, who is on a missions trip to Cambodia with YWAM. Her parents were missionaries for many years and she's following in their footsteps. She's the one taking the selfies. Dark hair, big smile.

Shalom and Merry Christmas! Thanks for the visit!

Had some snow...

I'm guessing about 8 inches, though it might be more. Adam made the kids a snow fort with a pallet frame. Merry Christmas!