Thankful for ..... A Finish!

Business first. I finished quilting and binding the quilt for my DDIL Kim for Christmas. She selected the orange peels and Hello Darling by Bonnie & Camille.  The quilt finished at 64x75”.

I couldn’t show it on Instagram because she follows my feed there. But here is a picture we snapped between stiff breezes a couple days ago. This was goal #9 on my Quarter 4 Finish Along Goals, which you can see here. This is my fifth finish for this quarter with several more to go. Yikes!!

Back in the early days of my blog (I have been blogging nearly 10 years - that anniversary will come next summer), I used to post vintage graphics for various holidays. As most of them are from old Victorian postcards, and as Thanksgiving was not a national holiday a hundred-plus years ago as it is now, Thanksgiving graphics are hard to come by.  But I did find a few seasonally appropriate ones, so I will include them here. Feel free to right click and save them on your computer; they are copyright-free. So, while I blather on talk about a few things, the pictures will be interspersed.

I don’t usually get sappy at this time of year, but a few readers have remarked (and one even wrote personally) to say how upbeat I seem in my posts, especially given not only the end-of-year Holiday preparations and tons of sewing projects to finish, but our ongoing construction. And let’s not kid ourselves, as adults (and regardless of which candidate you were rooting for), this election cycle has taken a lot out of us these last few weeks. There was no hiding from it.

I am a Glass Half Full person. So, yes, I am upbeat, despite the disappointing-to-me election results (and the sheer number of persons who voted for his intolerance), despite the colder and darker weather that is upon us as autumn turns into fall, and despite the continual delays and messes that the living room (and eventually the hall and back bedroom) remodel throw at us. Why? Because there is so much to be thankful for!

During the election, I was bothered by the phrase “Make America Great Again”. To me, that was a Glass-Half-Empty viewpoint. Excuse me, folks, but America is ALREADY great.  We are free to live and worship (or not) as we like, to own homes, raise families, obtain medical care, get in our cars and drive when and where we want for leisure and entertainment.

We have myriad opportunities to work and a system that allows us to retire and continue to live well when we are old and tired. We can mail a letter across the country for less than 50 cents for crying out loud! We can talk or Skype on the phone to friends and family around the world. We have freedom of speech. Our water is clean (unless we live in Flint - shame on those crooked politicians!), our air is relatively clean (and they are working on it), and we have ready access to more food than we could possibly need.  And we are in the minority of humans on this planet who can say all those things. 

Anyway, those are major things that I often take for granted, but am truly thankful for. There are also bazillions of tiny things that we take for granted, and for those I am thankful as well. That my family comes to visit and play regularly. That my house is warm and my cats love us and keep us company when we are home. That we can go out to dinner if I don’t feel like cooking. That my order from the fabric store arrived today so I can begin my next quilt. And even that a lace client placed a large order today (and that commission will finish off my Christmas shopping). 

I am also grateful for a loving husband with a great sense of humor. We have been together for 14.5 years (married 13.5), and we are still laughing together and planning together and having fun. Plus, he feels it’s his manly duty to clean the turkey and prepare it for the roasting bag. How lucky am I?

Yes, dear, the turkey is cooking!

I just got word today that our cabinets won’t be ready until NEXT Wednesday (Nov. 30). That will be almost 4 weeks to construct it all when it was supposed to be 2 weeks. Oh well, what can I do? In the meantime, the flooring project will move down the hall and hubby can begin hooking up all the wired-in electronics. I can still schedule the delivery of the furniture on time, because it wasn’t going to be ready until Dec. 7-8 anyway.  And the silver lining is that Alfie and Darla will have more time to run around on the floors (sans furniture) like idiots.

Our Thanksgiving will be just Bruce and me, along with my adult son Shane. Shane is a single dad, and his daughter London will be with her mom for Thanksgiving this year. We’ll have turkey, veggies (some from the garden), stuffing, mashed potatoes (also from the garden), pumpkin pie, and beer/wine/coffee. After eating, the guys will putter around with electronics and projects in Bruce’s laBORatory, then they’ll probably whip out their guitars. I will sew, or peruse Pinterest. We’ll talk and relax. So much to be thankful for!!

What are you doing? Whatever it is, may it be joyous, delicious and warm!!

Hugs,