Busy busy

Oh dear. Once again it’s been two weeks since I last wrote. I hope I’m not creating a habit here.

On Monday the 16^th I officially signed up for Medicare. I got my card yesterday and on the first of May I will be eligible. I haven’t needed a doctor for a while… and I hope that continues. When I do, I’ll have to learn to navigate this system.

That week was just an amazingly crazy week. We came back from Jonathan’s and I had TONS of stuff I needed to catch up on and do. One of the major ones was that I had a Clayton Makepeace webinar on Monday. I’m going to his pricy Financial Intensive in May and I’d turned in homework for him to review. I was pleased that he liked my ideas. I now have to work on it more… but it’s been nearly two weeks and I have not touched it again.

I had some work for Newsmax I was doing with some pretty short deadlines—like 48 hours. It was the first time I’d done this kind of email, but after one revision, she thought it was great.

I had agreed to sing at our ward’s Visiting Teaching convention on Thursday. They should have been simple songs, but the harmony was a bit odd. So we practiced Sunday, Tuesday and then Thursday before the program. And I practiced some at home as well. It was lovely haunting music and I think the program went well. I had invited two people to go with me and they both said they would. I was trying to figure out how I could take them and still practice. But then they both dropped out. I was sad. But it made it easier to go to the practice.

I have been working on a book on customer retention and renewals for continuity programs—especially financial newsletters. I’d like to have it finished, printed and ready to take when I go to the financial intensive in May. So I’ve been finishing it. Tom has been great to proof read it for me. This week I finally got it mostly formatted and if I can get the cover finished, I think it may be able to go to the printer (create space print on demand) on Monday. I will be glad to have it done… but even published is not done. When I get the first copy, I’ll find all the mistakes I didn’t track done in the many revisions I’ve already done.

I bought a book layout that I thought would make things very simple. But since I’ve spent about 16 hours putting the book into the format and working on the cover layout, I don’t think it’s very simple at all. It does look lovely, though.

For our Women’s retreat, we are making fabric covered journals for each sister (200). We want to give her a chance to record the miracles, blessings and tender mercies that come into her life each day. I’ve been cutting out fabric—using scraps that I have. A sister gave me some of her scraps, too. Then on Tuesday of this week, three of us got together and pasted. Ugh. I think we did about 60 in two hours. They each took about 18 home to finish. I finished my 18. And my poor secretary has nearly 100 to do.

Saturday, Tom was trying out his new tractor and took a load of dirt and rocks over to Ernie’s house to put in a big dip in his driveway. He decided to come around from the side to dump it. Unfortunately, he forgot there is a swale or a seasonal bog there and got the tractor well stuck in the mud. We tried to pull it out with the truck, but no luck. And they were predicting more rain. So I called a neighbor and he came over with his little tractor. But he had a longer chain, so he was mostly on the drive and with some tire spinning, he was able to pull Tom’s big tractor out. It was a little exciting!

 Lilac's blooming and fountain flowing.

We have been having rain and our tulips and phlox have been magnificent. We planted the garden and have little heads of broccoli now. Our asparagus is growing and we are feasting on that. But our little sugar snap peas are only an inch or so tall. If the weather gets hot, we may not have any of them. Still, it’s fun to get the garden started again.

Last Sunday we had a ward conference in Houston. It’s about 2 hours north east of us. I ended up being gone over 12 hours that day. The day started with training at 8:30 am. Then I taught the lesson in Relief Society. It was on a great topic—the blessing of the Word of God. After church we were to have lunch and go visiting. But the visitee’s fell through so we just chatted. Then at 3pm we had Stake Council. It’s always interesting.

This week was a little less hectic. I continued work on the journals and the book project. I got a quick assignment from Newsmax and I need to work on my HVAC newsletter. I have the article ideas approved. I also got the article outline approved for my 1/month executive coach article and got that written.

I’ve been trying to work on my family history—going back on the Donop line. I found where two sisters—Pauline and Antoniette (sisters to Franz Anton) married two brothers—Otto and Joachim Roder. When I was given options of “is this the same person?” on Family Search, they seemed to connect into to a Roeder family with lots of children, two of whom married Pauline and Antoniette Donop. But the marriage dates are different… and Pauline is married to a different brother. So I think they ARE connected… I just need to straighten out the pieces.

Thursday and Friday Tom and I went to St. Louis to the temple. It was a nice trip. We took some of the Donop family names and were able to do 6 endowments and about the same number of sealings.

Saturday Tom had a primary activity where the bishopric went to breakfast with the primary children and then played church jeopardy. Tom’s team won. The primary presidency was pleased with what the children knew. The questions were all taken from Primary sharing times for the past 18 months. And the children knew most all the answers.

Cute story: Pam’s autistic great-grandson has just been going to church for perhaps the past 6 months. He was riding the bus home from school. One kid said, “I’m the Avenger!”  Another kid said, “I’m Iron Man!”  Her grandson pipes up, “I’m the Prophet Moses!”

After the activity, Tom joined other men helping to put in 150’ of fence line for one of our members who was just diagnosed with terminal cancer. He had just built a new house and needed this part fenced off as part of an easement agreement. I’m glad they were able to put his mind at rest on this point at least.

We had great Sacrament talks today. Really, good lessons all around. Now I need to finish letters to missionaries, finalize plans for our RS Women’s Retreat, and visit with family!

Two Weeks!

Sorry that I took a break last week. So here is a two week update.

Deborah and family came to visit over her children's Spring Break. I went home with Deborah on Sunday March 29^th and spent two nights at her house. It was lovely to spend more time with her family. I did go to ½ of ½ and do some therapeutic shopping.

Early Tuesday morning Deborah drove me to the airport. I didn’t realize that a flight that got me to LA about noon and left at 6am meant I had to be up by 4AM!  Nevertheless, the flights were uneventful and Cynthia was waiting at the airport for me. We stopped by her office to collect some of her things—as she was moving to a home office. And then we went out for a nice lunch. It was fun to chat and catch up.

It was so nice to see Mom (GG). She is doing well. She says her vision is not as good as it was and sometimes she is tired, but she did a good job keeping up with us all. I settled in on Tuesday.

Wednesday we went to dinner at Cynthia and Jim’s house. Thursday Steve and Kathy came to visit. He had a meeting in California the following week and flew out to spend some time with Mom. He introduced me to the Atkins diet and I tried it for a few days. I loved eating all the fat and protein I wanted. Doing without sugar and carbs was a bit harder. I did learn how to eat a hamburger with a “lettuce bun.”  It actually tasted pretty good… as did a LTB sandwich wrapped in lettuce.

One day we took Mom shopping and got a new toaster oven for her. I was on the lookout for wall paper that I could use as the exterior for programs for our spring stake women’s retreat. It seemed like we passed the time in a maze of eating, talking, shopping and such.  One day Cynthia came over and we decorated Easter eggs. 

 Here are the eggs wrapped and ready to be dyed.

We dyed them in natural dyes-- onion, eggplant, orange peels, and beets.  The onion ones turned out nicely.  The beets-- not so much. I think we left them in too long. The other were quite pale, too.

One evening—noon time???-- Sally drove down with Walter Donop, Jr. and we had a meal at Cynthia’s house. He seemed pleased to see us and to be included in the visit. Sally brought a bunch of Donop genealogy down to look at.

I was able to watch both sessions of Saturday General Conference. Then on Sunday, I got most of the first session before taking Mom to Easter Sunday at her church. I watched the afternoon session and then we went to Sherrill Macur’s (my cousin) house for Easter dinner. She had decorated her house very nicely and has such a beautiful house with a great view. It was fun to visit with her and her husband Roger, Aunt Ruth (her mom) Cynthia and Jim and Steve and Kathy.

We talked politics and religion which was quite interesting as the group ranged from liberal to conservative, religious to not very. It did get a little lively… but I don’t know that anyone was mortally offended.

Monday Sally came down again and we looked at the Donop genealogy. We tried to see if we put in some names in the family tree on LDS.org if we would find someone else who was also working on the line… but we could not. We spent some time reviewing some of the things Mom had on her list from when she first moved. Who had asked for what?  Had they gotten it?  Did she have things she was ready to give away that people wanted?  It was pretty complicated. I think we may have to create a new list and try again. She did divide up some bracelets and earrings she no longer had a use for. I got a wonderful clunky copper one. Then when I packed, it was so tight, I had no place for it. So I wore it home. I found it matched what I was wearing that day… and the next. So I guess it really is my color.

Monday afternoon we went to the Department of Motor Vehicles and turned in mom’s license for an ID card. It was a bit of a process, but everyone was very nice. And in a few weeks she should have her ID card.

Tuesday Mom and I went on a marathon shopping trip. I found some wall paper that would do for my program covers. Mom wanted greeting cards so we found a dollar store. Jim had foot surgery that day so we wanted some get well cards for him.

Then we hit Trader Joes, had lunch at a nice little bakery, and looked for some clothes for mom at Marshalls and Nordstrom’s off the Rack. We found a few things for her.  We left about 10:30 am and got home about 4 pm. We were both tired. Had an easy meal and I packed my bags.

Wednesday Cynthia came for breakfast and we chatted. Jim’s surgery went well and he seemed to be pain free at least at that time. Then mom had a friend from church take me to the airport. He was a Kenyan, so we had a lovely chat as we drove to the airport. His manner of speech took me back to our mission.

I did some work on the plane, then succumbed to a book. I got to Fayetteville about 10pm and there was my sweet daughter waiting to pick me up!  I love my family!  The next morning, Deborah and all the non-school children (Simon, Christopher, and Samantha) and I drove up to Mt. Vernon, MO to Jonathan’s new house.

Jonathan had driven down with a U-Haul full of food storage and furniture. We spent the next few days assembling furniture and cleaning. He had the floors sanded and stained. They had not applied the finish coat yet because we were going to be there before it had a chance to dry. However the dust had gone all over the place. So we cleaned and dusted and wiped out cupboards. We weeded their small garden patch and Jonathan planted some seeds. We walked the perimeter of the 40 acres and got a feel for the property and where fencing was needed. It was nice to spend time with Jonathan.

We left Jonathan's about noon on Saturday. The freeway was lined with redbud trees.

We came home in time for me to fix chicken salad (for Sunday) and then go to a baptism. Tom was doing the baptizing and I was leading music. We had this sweet woman in our home for lessons, so we were excited for her.

Once we came home, I needed to finish some writing homework, plan Relief Society Training, and practice some songs. Sunday I needed to train the RS, and practice these songs… all at the same time! AKK. I was also supposed to go to another meeting—but got excused from that.

I had my counselors and secretary start the training, while I went and practiced with 6 other sisters for the Relief Society visiting teaching event on Thursday. Then I came back and participated in the training. This is a new RS presidency and they were very attentive to the training. That took longer than I thought it would, but it was good.

Afterwards, about 3pm, my counselor and secretary came over to my house. Tom had Bishop’s Youth Discussion just about over as we arrived. I served the meal I thought we might do for the Stake Women’s Retreat and they pronounced it good. We discussed how to fix it and what we should do for desert. We covered programs and decorations and I think have finalized most things. We inventoried our paper supplies and made lists of things to shop for and price. We finally got done with that about 5 pm. Phew!  What a day.

Tom took me on a walk around the property to see the dogwood in bloom. My phlox are so lovely and showy in front and my flowering quince bush is glorious. Tulips are blooming and so is the lilac bush. Spring is a wonderful time.

Now I’ve written to missionaries and to grandchildren. I have other notes to write. But I think I may be done for the night. 

Deborah's visit

We had a lovely week with Deborah and children visiting.  Deborah drove up Monday morning.  The children really liked the trampoline and we had weather warm enough so they could enjoy it.

Tuesday the weather turned cooler and rainy.  If you check Steven's coat, you can actually see snow falling... but it wasn't cold enough to stick. From 60's and daffodils to snow... it's MARCH!

  We got a sitter for the kids and Tom, Deborah, Sarah and I drove to Branson to see the SIX-- six brothers who sing a capella. They create all the sounds of the accompaniment-- drums, etc. vocally.

We arrived early to pick up our tickets, then walked over to Andy's for dinner/snack before going to the show.  It showed signs of rain, so I drove the car the three parking sections over to Andy's.  Good thing.  It had been lightening and thundering.  Then rain and hail came to accompany the sound.

Andy's had only outdoor seating... with a pretty ample roof over it.  Did the others want to be safe and sit in the car? Noooo.  We got misted on as the wind blew under the covering, but we also had a spectacular view of raindrops splashing on the ground.

 We enjoyed the SIX program.  Sarah said they were too loud. But I think she enjoyed it. The babysitter spent the night, so  Tom and Sarah took her home the next morning.

Adam's tenant moved out and a new one is moving in.  So Tom worked to finish up the last things that needed to be done before they moved in.  I worked on copywriting and finished my Newsmax renewal series.  Now I need to find more work.

I reached out to people on LinkedIn and tried to connect with people publishing financial newsletters.  I'm hoping I can build relationships that way that will lead to work.

Early this week we got a sad phone call from a less active sister I visit teach.  They are a great couple.  They moved into the ward about 2 years ago and just finished building their dream house the first of this year.  They still have finishing touches to make on it.

The husband had been having headaches.  They went in once... and went to the emergency room.  They said it was cancer and asked if they had a living will.  Shocker!  So sad.  They went to the VA hospital.  At first the news seemed better- tumor on the lung and the head, but both appeared to be operable.  Then, Thursday, the news turned bleak again.  No, it was terminal.  They could remove the one on the brain as a palliative measure, but....  I felt so sad.  They are younger than Tom and I.

When Tom and I were looking at houses for Jonathan and Kristy, many of them had been built as the "perfect" home for the homeowners, without concern for resale. And then they had to move due to age or ill health.  It made me think this is not a good idea.

But it also  made me think about our lives.  If one of us found out we had a short time to live... would we have regrets?  Would we have wanted to have done something else?  Travel more?  Spend time on other things?  It made me appreciate Tom and the fact that he's ALIVE! I think we can always be kinder to each other. And I think we are living the life we want to live.

One day Tom wanted to go and try to visit a young single sister who we had not been able to connect with for a long time.  We heard she'd moved back to her grandparent's house.  So we drove over there to ask them where she was.  She was in the hospital, she'd just had a baby and the baby had some respiratory problems.  So we went to the hospital to visit.  Her mother and the father of the child was there.

They were pleased to see us... at least the active mother was.  We visited and later Tom gave the baby a blessing.  The mother thanked us for taking care of her daughter (Mom lives in another state)  I said, "We tried, but she escaped!"  Mom said, "Yes, that is her modus operandi."

Later that week they needed someone to wipe down walls in a trailer that had been smoked in... so the baby would not have to deal with stale smoke. On short notice we actually had 5 sisters willing to help out.  Two showed up when Tom and I got there and between the 4 of us it took less than 45 minutes to get it done.  We called the others and said thanks... but it's done.  I love our sisterhood!

During the week I cut the children's hair.  Sarah wanted her hair from LONG to short.  We cut it shoulder length.

Saturday night was the General Women's Broadcast.  Deborah, Sarah and I went.  It was nice to have three generations of Fox/Recks going out together.  They had an ice cream social before going into to listen to the broadcast.  It was about strengthening families and valuing motherhood.

We had fast and testimony meeting this Sunday as next week will be general conference.  I invited my neighbor to go to church with me because her car wasn't working.  I agreed to skip choir to take her and then skip part of Sunday School to return  her home.  She appreciated the effort and seemed to enjoy church.

After church I packed and then left with Deborah to go to her house.  I'll hang out there on Monday and then fly on Tuesday to visit Mom.

Lambs! Baby lambs!

This week Tom went up to visit Jonathan and Kristy and help get their house ready to put on the market.  He left early Monday morning. Kristy had a list of "honey-do's" for Tom to do. So he kept busy changing out our ceiling fans, and light fixtures, fixing doors, moving the pigeon coop away from the house, etc.

The children were out of school, so he had a greater chance to read to them, listen t them read, take them to the park-- while he went running-- and just have fun.

It was also the beginning of lambing season. While he was there, three sheep had babies- a single birth, twins, and triplets!

Tom drove back home on Saturday and got here about 5 pm.

I tried to be super efficient this week... and succeeded part of the time. I've been in the process of writing a book on retention and renewal for financial newsletters.  This is my niche market.  I spent about 15 hours this week writing the book and have the first draft completed.  I was excited about that.

The goal of writing a book and setting myself up as an "expert" in this area is so people will come to me offering work instead of me reaching out.  It was exciting that this week a financial newsletter publisher did reach out to me asking about my services!

Monday and Tuesday I went visiting teaching. I had been thinking that I should ask less actives to help out with things. So I asked a sister who does a lot of sewing if she'd help with the project the Relief Society is doing-- making pillow case bags for foster kids to transport their personal things in when they are taken out of a home or moved between homes.  She was happy to do so.

Wednesday I asked my neighbor if she wanted to go to the family history center and she came in with me. I slogged through more efforts to track down Bernhard Donop.  I think I may have found his passage over here in 1851.  He came in a sailing vessel!

We need to get started on the garden.  I went and dug a little more around the edges. My goal is if I put in this 10" metal flashing, it will keep the weeds from encroaching.  We'll see how it works.
I think I'm late in planting peas, beets, broccoli and onions.

Certainly the trees think it's spring.  Our peach tree is lovely and our daffodils are all a-blooming.

Ward Conference Week

We’ve had warm weather this week. The crocuses are blooming and we even have a few daffodils showing their yellow heads. Our peach tree is starting to green. Silly tree. Doesn’t it know that we’ll have another cold snap and all its blossoms with die off?  It does this every year. The pear tree is much wiser. It waits until the frost chances are over before blossoming out.

Tuesday I drove to Ava for their Relief Society Birthday celebration and spoke to them on the Oil in Your Lamp program and ways to receive inspiration and revelation.  Then Wednesday I took a sister to a Dr. appointment. While she was there I visited a sister in the nursing home. Then in the afternoon we went visiting teaching.

Thursday we worked a little in the morning. Adam’s house went vacant and there was a problem in the bathroom floor. It turned out the toilet had been leaking and damaged the floor. So Tom cut away the bad parts and patched it and then put down vinyl planking.

In the afternoon we drove to St. Louis to go to the temple. Our plan was to do one session Thursday evening and two on Friday and then come home. We stopped at Trader Joe’s, checked into the hotel, had dinner and headed to the temple. Hmmm. The parking lot was nearly empty. Ugh!  They were closed for cleaning?  How did we not know that?

It must have been inspiration that had me put in the HMDI cord—so we could watch Netflix on the TV from the computer. Thursday, we thought about sightseeing in St. Louis, but it was a drizzly day. So we drove home a by a scenic route. We went through little towns, stopped at a used furniture store, and a little place for lunch and got home about 3pm.

We had been wanting to do in Roger Jr. and Roger III. The roosters were wearing out our hens. But we had to be home in the evening, after they went in to roost. So Friday night we did the deed. We killed, plucked, and eviscerated them. I pressure cooked one that night. The other went into the frig. With older chickens, you need to pressure cook them to get them tender.

Saturday Tom went back to Adam’s house to continue the project. I drove to Mountain View—about 1 hr. 30 min. to go to their Relief Society Celebration and speak. We really have lovely ladies in our stake. They are genuine and down-to-earth.  

The next day was to be Ward Conference. So Tom—who had been mulling over his talk for weeks—finally had to sit down and put it on paper. He was also kind enough to make brownies that I was supposed to bring for the lunch. I worked on my training and read the RS lesson. My first counselor was to give the lesson… but with all the rain, she was concerned she might not be able to cross her low-water bridges from house to road.

My secretary asked if she could spend the night, since they live 1.5 hours away. So I invited her and her daughter for dinner… which meant I had to cook. We did have a delightful visit. And we worked on dividing up the invitations I’d picked up on Friday. They were invitations that needed to go to the wards and branches in the stake announcing our stake relief society spring event.

I also wanted to make journals of Miracles, Blessings, and Tender Mercies for each sister. So while my secretary divided and sorted, I glued different fabrics onto composition books and glued the invitation onto the front of them. One of the sisters in our ward is an artist and a graphic designer and she created the invitations. They are bright and cheerful.

Here is a sample of the front of the invitation glued onto a journal.

Today went well. Tom spoke about family history and hastening the work. The choir sang the song that has been in my head for weeks. The RS lesson was great—my counselor was able to get out. We had a nice lunch and went to visit afterwards. We saw two sisters I hadn’t seen for a while and had nice visits.

And now I’m home writing letters and blogs. Here was the view from our living room window into the front yard. If you look closely, you can see three deer in our yard.

More Snow

This week started out with a prediction of more snow, or sleet, or ice or all of the above.

Tom took me out early Monday morning to check out the tractor he’d been pondering all weekend. He said it was a little bigger than he wanted, BUT it was a good price, it had been well taken care of, it was a John Deer. It had a good bucket…

So we went out in the snow and slush and took a look. Tom drove it. It actually turned in a very small radius and had power steering!  The bucket went up really high!  It was such a fun toy!  So money changed hands.

Tuesday bright and early, Tom went to pick up his new prized possession. The ground was thawing and too soft to put the tractor back by the barn, so it got a special place on the parking pad and a nice warm tarp to cover it from the coming snow.

Tuesday night we invited the missionaries and an investigator over for dinner. I had it all planned. My mouth watered for a baked pasta and chicken casserole. Then, about 3pm, I checked my planner. Argh!  She needed a gluten free meal. No problem. I could switch to Mexican Chicken casserole. I had the chicken, the corn tortillas, home-made salsa…. By now it’s closer to 5pm with dinner at 6. I read the label on the Cream of Mushroom soup. Gaaa! Wheat!

But I remembered Jonathan’s chicken enchiladas that didn’t use soup. It called for a rue of butter and flour, then chicken stock and sour cream to thicken it. It seemed like it would be a good substitute for the soups. So I winged it with that. The casserole was tasty and less “jucy” than I usually make it. And Tom pronounced it delicious. I also had beans, green salad, and applesauce for dinner.

And then as I was bringing out the Congo Squares Tom had made the day before, she asked, “Are these gluten free?” Rats! Forgot again. She seemed happy to make due with a Hershey’s chocolate bar.

We had a nice lesson after that on the Plan of Salvation.

Wednesday they predicted terrible weather. They’d been forecasting it all week. Sleet, freezing rain (is there a difference?) then snow with accumulations of 4-6 inches. Everything closed. All the schools… so that meant no church activities that night either.

Wednesday morning arrived… nothing. Tom ran errands in town… nothing. Then about 11 it started to rain. By 12 it was sleet. By 1 it was snow. And it kept snowing. It snowed up until 9pm or so. And we did get about 6 inches!

 Beginning snow.

 Advanced snow.  There is a driveway someplace in that picture.

 Evening snow.  You can see the footprints to feed the chickens.

 The day after.  Sunny and bright.

This was snuggle-in-front-of-the-fireplace week. We kept the fire going. I took the laptop downstairs and sat in the recliner and worked. I really enjoyed working down there. Tom would come down and visit and occasionally nap. It was nice to stay warm and cozy.  This is Tom's revenge.  Last week I took a photo of him snoozing. I'm really just in deep meditation...

Thursday Tom got to practice using the new tractor as his “snow shovel.”  He did a great job of cleaning off the circular drive. It also started warming up and some of the snow melted.  Notice our warped snow-thing in front.

I decided it was time to stop the creeping up of the scale. So I started the cabbage soup diet. I find if I can drop some weight, my body resets itself to that weight. If I keep eating sensibly it will maintain that weight. Alas, I seldom keep eating sensibly. But it takes a few years to pack the weight back on.

Friday Tom was able to put the tractor under the overhand of the barn (it won't fit in the barn because it is too tall). It has a cover over the driver’s seat and a rollbar. So it just squeaked under… after Tom made some modifications to the roof joist. Tom and I also made some snowmen to commemorate the snow. And we went walking—trying to avoid the snow—at Rossi road park.

Saturday we walked again and we also did a little more digging in the garden to put in our metal flashing weed/turtle barrier. By Saturday afternoon probably 95% of the snow had melted.  We also went to visit a friend in a rehab-nursing home who is making a slow recovery from surgery.  I took her some books and discovered she is a Georgette Heyer fan as well.

Saturday evening some friends, the Pfiefers, came over and we played Empire building Monopoly. They had invited us out for ice cream… and I withstood the temptation by inviting them over to our house instead. This variety of Monopoly was a fun game. Only 3 kinds of bills, no hotels or houses, but a lot of property exchanging (willing or not) and a great deal of luck. Frank went to jail probably 6 times and in every way possible—rolling doubles, Chance card- for fraud, and landing on “go to jail.”

It’s a game her 8 and 9 year olds enjoy and it doesn’t take forever to play it!  I recommend it for kids and adults.

Sunday I substituted as a Relief Society teacher. It was a nice easy lesson to teach and I think it went well. Tom had BYD here after church. He made great snacks for the kids. I think they have no idea how much he does for them.

This coming week, temperatures should stay above freezing day and night. It’s a “sucker hole” to make me think I can start planting your garden. We’re sure to get more freezing nights.

More Snow

 This week strayed a bit snowy and I mostly stayed inside. Tom, the intrepid, of course went out.

I got a new subscriber to my HVAC newsletter and worked on adapting the spring issue to his  needs.At times I feel like I am in a holding pattern-- waiting for other people to act on things so I can. I think the second life insurance book will move forward... if both parties agree on the wording of the agreement.  I was awaiting a new offer for the most recent renewal email series I've been working on since November... Just got it on Friday.

I decided to write a book on retention and renewals since I had time and I needed to market myself more. I have over 3000 words written on that.  It's a good start.

I called and sent letters and tried to visit some of my visiting teaching sisters.  No... I didn't wait until the last of the month.  I'd been calling and visiting throughout the month as well. It's just with the snowy weather I wanted to make sure they were okay.

Thursday Tom and I went to an estate planning seminar given by Randall Drake. It was a good review and a good reminder that everyone needs to plan for their health care and their family and money care in case of death or incapacitation. There are some things we need to update. In the evening I went to the Relief Society activity.  It was fun just to sit and visit with my friends.  The refreshments was a Chocolate theme... what's not to like about that. Tom kindly made fudge for me to take. It was a hit!

Winter came late this year, but it's coming now with enthusiasm. We stayed below freezing for most of the week. So while we had some thaw from last week's storms, we still had snow on the ground when it began falling again on Friday night.

About 10:30 Friday, after Tom and I finished a movie, we went outside and swept the snow from a good part of the driveway. By Saturday morning you could not see where we'd swept.  All this drive was cleared the night before.

and where we hadn't. Then all day Saturday we had this wonderful gentle snowfall. It was so beautiful to watch.  You can see the snow falling in front of the tree house.

Tom wanted to go out Saturday afternoon and visit someone and check out the church parking lot. So he dragged me along.  I'm not a fan of driving on snowy roads. When we got to the main roads in town many of them were plowed. We went and visited a sister who had surgery. It was a good visit for her. She needed cheering up.

 When we checked the church, some good Samaritan had plowed the parking lot. The 1st counselor was there cleaning the sidewalks, so Tom joined him in cleaning walks while I went inside and practiced the piano... well ... dinked on the piano. We stopped and shopped a little, then Tom rewarded me for braving the snow by taking me to dinner at a nice little Italian place.

Saturday night the snow turned to sleet and freezing rain.  In the morning, the snow had a sheen of ice and where we'd cleared the driveway looked like a skating rink.

  Tom said it felt like that, too.  So church was canceled.   By noon the temperature had warmed up and much of the ice was gone.  By late afternoon, even the snow on the fields and lawn is down to a thin layer of white.

Tom and I have had a very lazy Sunday reading, writing, and snoozing in front of the fireplace.