Guess who is 62 now?  That’s right, it’s this woman.  I wore my witch hat for Hallowe’en and my tunic with stars and had my familiar with me.  I enjoyed the day.  We had a party at work and then I came home and gave out candy to the few kids who came to our door.  There are fewer and fewer houses participating and fewer and fewer kids.  

We had a Chinese food celebration on Saturday night and the girls came for my birthday.  I got to introduce my grandson to fried dumplings and udon noodles with chicken.  He was more interested in playing with the noodles than eating them but he did a good job managing the little fork to pick them up.

Monday was my actual birthday and Elanor sent me flowers at work.  They’re just beautiful.  Daisies (one of my favorite flowers) and pink roses and pink polka dotted ribbon.  She knows me well.

We have begun the quick slide into the holidays.  I absolutely love this time of year.  I love cooking Thanksgiving dinner, even though it will be just 3 of us.  The number doesn’t matter, it’s the ritual of the baking of the pies, the making of the fruit relish and the baking of the cornbread for the stuffing.  I have one month to practice baking in our new oven.  It’s been a long time since I really worried about something splattering in the oven or boiling over on the stove.  Now, I feel honor bound to scrub all the messes up right away.  I know the time will come when we pay less attention to these things but the stove is still new and shiny.  

Our stove hood should be delivered next week and then we have to choose tile to go up on the wall behind it.  Slowly but surely, we are doing the things we’ve wanted to do but have not been able to since Pk’s job was not secure (it still isn’t secure but it’s less insecure now than it was before).  Being a contractor is not conducive to long range planning.  

We have to wait to see how Kate and Patrick want to work out the holiday visitation schedule.  James has 5 grandparents who would all like to be with him for Christmas morning.  There is just not enough room and it would be too much commotion with all of us and the dogs.  We figured, Kate will let us know what’s best for Jamie.  

I got Lindt chocolate advent calendars for the girls for December, Peter Kevin got one from the Metropolitan Museum of Art (it’s a pop up tree with 24 little birds to put on, one for each day) and I got a yarn advent calendar.  24 little skeins and then a pattern to use with them at the end.  

We wrapped up the fig tree and are putting the garden to bed for the winter.  There are 2,000 bulbs waiting to be planted for next spring.  Pk does not do things halfway......

One more hour and I can head home.  I have 10 more angels to finish for the ornament exchange and if I’m lucky, I’ll finish them today.  The crocheting is all done, just the assembling has to be done.  

Aren’t they adorable?  Otherwise, I have no firm plans for holiday knitting.  If I finish the Swedish Fish socks, I’ll wrap them up for Pk, I have some other things otn that may become gifts.  I haven’t done much spinning lately.  I think I might enjoy that for a while.

How about you?  Are you making plans?  Are you already in the midst of preparations?  Do you enjoy this time of year?

Bye for now!