I'd Be Running Up That Road, Be Running Up That Hill. . . .

While napping yesterday afternoon, I dreamed that while talking with Mom in her kitchen, I mentioned missing being able to write letters to Grammy and how I always ache when I see pink things in the stores that look like something she'd love.  "You can write to her or send her anything you want," Mom responded, clearly puzzled.  "She loves hearing from you." It didn't feel at all like a dream, our interaction and the setting were so realistic.  I goggled at her a few moments before telling her I didn't understand.  What was wrong with Mom neurologically now, I wondered, just as I would in real life, that she didn't remember that her own mother has died?  She looked back at me with what was probably an expression identical to mine until I finally explained, "Mom--Grammy died.  Or. . .I thought she died. . . ?"  She looked both pained to hear me say that and relieved to understand finally why I had been so baffled.  I spelled out for her that I had thought--wrongly, it was turning out--that Grammy had died last January, we had all gone to her service in New York, and I had even spoken at it.  I told her I could share more details but that I didn't want to hurt her.  She said, sounding just how she would in real life, that it hurt her more to find out that I had thought Grammy had been gone going on two years and that I hadn't been in touch with her in all that time.  None of it even happened, I realized, a thrill of horror and gratitude sweeping over me:  Grammy is still alive!  Sommer's cousin isn't on a ventilator post-Covid!  Stuffed is still here with us!  Mikes' mom didn't have a stroke!  It was all a dream!  All the other losses of 2020 and 2021 were just bad dreams!  I started to cry from the incredible relief of it, and I woke up then for real, and really in tears.  Mom called a couple hours later to tell me that one of my cousins has a brain tumor.  January 2020-onward:  And so it goes. 

I pray and rest and appreciate beauty and keep in touch and listen to music and walk and work and cook good food and try to write and try to read, but life has felt more rough-patch-ish than not for so very long now--and for so many of us.  I told Mike the other day that although I don't feel like I can focus enough to write very well the past couple years and can't concentrate long enough to read as voraciously as I did before either, I need to keep trying.  It will be creativity that saves me this time, just as it has so many times before.  Bear with me, then, as I try to find the words to tell the stories.  It's been a long hard slog that has almost muted me, but I will keep trying.  

I will keep trying. 

October, November, & Now December 4th

I spent some time last night looking through twelve years' worth of my photo albums on flickr, and it struck me that all those years--every year of the past twelve except this one--seemed to have been [easier?  more creative?  less of a blur?] than this one, but then it further struck me that this year was just not as well-documented as past years.  :)  I keep a journal as always, and I take pictures almost every day, but since I haven't sorted them all into an album labeled 2019 yet, and since there are only thirteen blog posts before this one to tell 2019's story in images and words here, this year just somehow seemed "less."  (A-ha!)  'Funny how memory works.  This year really has been a blur, though, as every year anymore seems to speed by faster than the ones before.  

It seems like I was home for a visit with my parents Halloween-week maybe two weeks ago.  It stormed almost the entire time I was there, sheets of rain pouring onto the deck's roof and then flooding it.  I baked a gluten-free dark chocolate cake for my parents, 

helped Mom figure out her first cell phone, and watched game seven of the World Series with Dad.  Sometime overnight on Halloween, we lost power.  Mom's many candles were put to good use all over their little house the next morning.  The top photo is of their kitchen island as November began.  It was the most perfect Halloween-week weather. 

Mike's mom celebrated her eightieth birthday just as little Bianca was turning six--six?!  She was just three!  She was just BORN!--and somehow, cards, flowers (mother-in-law), and balloons (niece) made it to them on time.  "She was so cute skating with her friends," Mom reported of Bianca's roller rink party a few weeks ago.  But look at this dear little face--

--and tell me what she'd NOT be cute doing.  'So adorable.  ♥  And still a little imp.  :)  She began kindergarten this fall. . . bows on her knee socks, stuffed animal on her desk, and answering the question of what she wants to be when she grows up with:  "A detective."  A detective!  Of course, at her preschool graduation ceremony this spring, all the kids had facts about themselves announced to the audience as they walked across the stage.  Bianca's?  "Bianca likes cats."  Bianca likes cats!  Ha ha!  Sweet girl.  I get such a kick out of her.  :) 

I got this shot of my oldest and youngest nieces from the Thanksgiving table last week.  ♥  The mind boggles.  And what a rich time for my parents, I have been thinking, to be able to enjoy grandchildren who range from five-month-old to almost-sixteen.  My nephew will be old enough to drive soon.  Baby Dylan!?  Precious times, and precious time. 

Mike and I spent Thanksgiving day at my older brother's home and then spent the night at his mom's.  'Such a sweet holiday, and the craziness of my working life being what it is, this was the first Thanksgiving I'd spent with family since 2010.  2010.  There are a number of changes I need to make in my life in the next few years, and changing things like that is high on the list.  Late last Wednesday night, I finally decided what I wanted to make for dessert to go along with both brothers' pies, and especially given how little planning went into them, I'm so delighted by how both desserts turned out.  'Such a good feeling when a "baking vision" turns out.  :)  I went with gluten-free yellow cupcakes to have an option Mom could eat, and I tried the all-over-the-internet "pumpkin pie wedge" Rice Krispie Treats.  The first batch of the Rice Krispie Treats I made standard pie-slice-size and took to Mike's mom's since there was to be a smaller gathering there.  We totaled  fourteen at my brother's home, so I made mini pie slices with that batch.  'Dollop of homemade buttercream on each to mimic whipped cream.  :) 

The tiny pumpkins were crafted out of homemade fondant, one of my favorite little baking/dessert-making/cake-decorating things to play with the past fifteen or so years.  Mike is careful with his sugar intake, and I (always anymore, alas) need to lose weight, so I rarely make things like these Thanksgiving desserts, but it is so fun and relaxing, I should make the time more often and just give away all but a couple of whatever I've baked.  Or maybe I should play it safe and just buy some poylmer clay to craft desserts for dollhouses.  :) 

Mike's mom had fall leaf-patterned flannel sheets on the bed for Thanksgiving night--so sweet  ♥--and oh my goodness, it was the most comfortable bed and the coziest and most festive way to end the holiday. 

We returned home Friday evening to a cuddled-up-on-a-chair Stuffed, still going (relatively) strong at twenty years old.  ♥  I remembered just in time last week to get this fall's photo of him with the yellow trees outside the window, and he spent most of today on a nest of blankets beside the space heater while snow fell.  Dear sweet Stuffed.  ♥ 

I say life's been a blur, but I will also pat myself on the back here and point out that my Christmas cards have been ready to mail for a week, I'm almost done with my shopping, and I put up the tree a couple Sundays ago.  'Unprecedented holiday organization here, and it's making the entire month ahead feel better.  Onward and upward, then, and may it not take me three months to find my way back to my little online space here.  Happy December to you all.   

♥

An Ode to All the Sunset Watchers

I love my parents more all the time for their appreciation of beauty.  "Who wants to see something pretty?" Olivia Walton asks her family after finding her Christmas cactus blooming in The Homecoming, and every Christmas when I watch the movie--it is one of my favorites--I think of my parents.  "Dad!" I called into the house while Mom and I sat out on the deck last week, "You should come see this sunset.  It's gorgeous!"  It didn't at all surprise me to hear him promptly push his footstool away from his chair in the living room to come join us.  I love that not only wasn't I surprised that Dad put his crossword puzzle aside to look at a  pretty sky, but also that I'd called out to him already knowing that that would be the case:  It was a given.  I come from people who appreciate beauty.  This fireball of a sunset was only embers on the horizon after just a few minutes, making the watching of it with my parents all the sweeter. 

Not everyone does appreciate it, I have learned.  Not everyone jumps up to look when news of a striking sunset or sunrise or moon or vibrant Cardinal-in-a-tree is shared.  And what a sad and shabby way of living that has to be.  Whether it is the flash of the red bird against the snow-heaped branch or the flaming sunset over the neighbor's house, after all, it is flitting.  As Mike well-knows, one of my biggest pet peeves at work is my asking someone how his or her day is going and hearing in response an Eeyore-like "It's going."  Gah!  Typically, those who answer once with "It's going" answer every time with "It's going" too, I've noticed.  Life is just passing for them, and there they are just dragging themselves along with it, ball with chain.  "It's going."  GAH!  It's going, all right.  Shake a leg, wise up, this matters, this is it, come look at the *&$@%# sunset!  

A thank you to all of you, then, who share your home (and is Jane's home not the dearest!?  ♥), your yard (← that is one of my favorite photos that talented Lisa has shared over the years), your garden (bliss!), your holiday traditions (love!) and holiday tables (so cozy and colorful!  Cheryl's!  love!), your passions (and your smile, Margaret!), your party-planning (everything Melissa touches is lovely), your determination to become your best self (my favorite line of this post highlights why I so love Heather's blog:  "Life right now is about recognizing small victories so I took a moment, spiked a football and then got down on one knee and pointed to the sky."  Ha!  Writing that shines ♥), your poetry (← a favorite writer), your family (this story! ♥), your sunlight (gorgeous first photo, that!), your self-care rituals (and most-everything eighty-something-year-old Ernestine posts is an inspiration), your love of history (← a treasure-trove of research), your miracles and wonders (so much big-hearted goodness in Yankee's posts), and even your (darling) picnics. . . .Oh, I love it all, I'm grateful for it all, I could go on all day.  With every shared word and photo, you prove your life is not just "going."  Beautiful. 

Spring in My Parents' Yard

One of the joys of my last visit home two weeks ago was getting to see spring starting in my parents' yard.  My last evening there found me taking a break from watching Jurassic Park with Mom--actor Jeff Goldblum is one of our shared crushes--to try to take a few photos while it was still light out.  

Dad always shakes his head when he sees me admiring Dandelions, but I think they're beautiful. 

I keep arguing that he should think of Dandelions not as weeds but instead as a gift--free flowers!  and so many of them!--especially since we've enjoyed their greens in salads and he, at least, has liked dandelion wine, as well, but so far, we agree to disagree. 

The wind picked up while I was outside, but the rain held off until early morning.  The sound of rain falling against the roof of my parents' deck is one of my favorite sounds and something I miss from my four years living at that house with them. 

Ah, to see color outside again! 

Computer issues prevented me from writing again, post-visit, until now, and it has been interesting to me to feel myself missing this little space I carved out here back in January 2007 that I continue to use to share things I find beautiful and funny and wise and true and sweet. 

I still think it is worth it to make even such a small effort to share with others both life's "pretties" and its "pretty roughs."  I began this blog that winter as I emerged from a long period of depression, and I believe that even my coming up with its title was a bit of defiance that helped me focus and figure out how to stay strong and move forward. 

Exactly eight years ago today, it turns out--I posted this.  

The two weeks away from the blog this month clarified for me that maybe even more than the stories and the photos of the beautiful and the worthwhile that I share here, I love the determination to appreciate the beautiful and the worthwhile in the first place.  A sweet realization this spring.  ♥

A Giveaway and Six Years of Pretty Little Rough Patches

Six-Year Blog Anniversary Giveaway  ~  Click to enlarge pic.

This month marks six years that I've been writing here.  It was only a mere six months ago, though, that I made the blog public and findable by online search engines.  I Struggle with Shyness:  A post for another day.  :)  It was especially fun and rewarding this past fall and early winter, then, to find comments from new readers in my email inbox--I have all comments emailed to me--and to notice each time another person had found the blog and hit the "Follow" button.  When I learned that big-hearted at Vicki over at 2 Bags Full would be hosting an online blog party today, right before my blogging anniversary, to express her thanks for what blogging has brought into her own life and to help other bloggers meet, I asked to be added to the virtual guest list.  Blogging, even if I've done it quietly and kind of under-the-radar for so many years, has been a sweet thing in my life too, and I share her appreciation of it.  Thank you to Vicki ♥  and welcome to everyone who's visiting here via her party.  :) 

You know how people joke about visiting someone only to have to sit through his/her slide shows of vacations, pets, and family outings?  I'm a person who is thrilled by such things.  Tell me about your best friend from elementary school, your best friend now, the first person who broke your heart, the work you do and the work you want to do, the language you'd love to learn and the lesson you need to learn, the last movie you loved and didn't want to end and the last book you hated too much to finish, the flowers that most remind you of your grandmother, the birthday cake you always bake or buy for your wife, your funniest memory of your grandfather, the dress you'll save forever because you once had a perfect day wearing it, those songs that take you back to high school, that one dog who was your Best Dog EVER, the craziest neighbors you've ever had, and the kindness a stranger showed you the day your child died.  Give me your tired, your poor, your fridges covered in magnet-held family pictures and your scrapbooks bursting open with saved mementos. . . . ♥  Where did you find the piece of driftwood shaped like a seal?!  I love it.  ♥  Is that photo you and your sister when you were kids?!  ♥  Oh!  Your dog by the fireplace Christmas morning!  Look at his FACE!  ♥  Is that sketch of the house that you told me about?  ♥  That has to be your mom's photo above your chair--You look just like her.  ♥  My seventh-grade English teacher always had us spend one class period a week writing journal entries that we would hand in to her to read.  She said that we could write about absolutely anything and that that there was really nothing she didn't think was interesting.  I remember thinking, when I heard her say that, "Well, yeah, I'm the same way."  I hadn't known it until she articulated it, so that realization stuck in my memory.  And now I live in the Age of the Internet and get to see your slide shows and hear your stories this way, and every day, I find someone--and something--else that interests me.  And I love that. 

To celebrate six years here and to thank you for following along, I'm hosting my first-ever giveaway.  Everything (but my beloved old green check tablecloth) in this post's photos will be packed-up and shipped to the winner after I draw his/her name February 1st.  I had fun shopping for all the prizes and love putting care packages together, so this has already added some fun to my own week.  ♥   

The winner will receive: 

• Real Simple magazine's hardcover book Celebrations:  Easy Entertaining for Every Occasion, a big book that's full of ideas for gifts, meals, parties, invitations, and just thoughtful ways to make "everydays" into holidays and "special" occasions even more special
• one of my favorite books, Betty Smith's A Tree Grows in Brooklyn  ~  If you've read it, you know what a treasure it is, and if you haven't, I envy you the fact that you still have your first reading of it ahead of you.  Follow Francie as she grows from an eleven-year-old girl to a post-high school young woman.  I love this girl and her story.  
• the "love issue" of Sandra Lee's magazine, filled with recipes, tablescape and party ideas, Valentine-ey thoughts, and the most beautiful photos  ~  Her magazine is always a feast for the eyes and heart.
• a little book of 23 friendship-related stickers 
• 20 paper napkins covered in cupcakes-decorated-with-hearts
• 8 heart paper plates, also perfect for either Valentine's Day or any day
• 48 pink and red floral die-cut cupcake wrappers
• 4 packets of hot chocolate, each a different flavor
• 3 thinking-of-you-type cards with envelopes 
• 3 Valentine cards with envelopes 
• and 2 red-ink pens because, as some of you guys already know, I add red hearts to almost every piece of personal mail I send.  It's not just a "blog-thing."  ♥  :)

To see larger versions of the photos here, just click on them.  A reader mentioned the other day that it would be helpful if my blog's photos were bigger, but when I post extra-large versions of photos with this blog design/layout, their sides get cut off a little bit--and I really love this design/layout.  (I tried, Jenny!)

To enter, just leave a comment on this post--and please make sure that either your comment or profile gives me a way to contact you if you should win.  Any comment with a date of January19th-January 31st will count, and I'll randomly choose a name and announce the winner here on February 1st.  You don't need to "follow" to enter.  I hope you'll follow if you want to, though, of course.  :)

Good luck!  And a truly warm welcome to you new readers and an equally-heartfelt thank you to those who have been with me either from my very first post in 2007 or since earlier this week.  I've loved sharing the past six years here.  Keep telling your own stories.  Make time for your friends.  Finish and mail the letter you keep meaning to write.  Offer a piece of gum to the person sharing the elevator with you.  Keep putting yourself out there.  Say thank you.  And remember that even when it's rough, life is good and beautiful and worth the effort.  Ride it out.  Find the silver lining.  Go hug your cat.  ♥

xox♥, Val