My Tire Garden

 When I got home from shopping this morning there were two fire trucks and four other vehicles in our driveway. Half of my tire garden was destroyed and the flower bed next to the carport.

None of our buildings were damaged, but lots of plants look dead. They might put out from the roots, but the large lavender bushes, several little gnomes and a garden lady are gone.

Planning to Shop

I have been trying to decide how to shop cheaper.  It isn't something I've done before (that I remember, anyway). I usually just try to shop quickly because I seriously hate to shop.
But I have a couple of ideas for tomorrow. I have a sale flyer with some prices on it of things we eat. About the only price I actually know is tomato soup cost 75 cents the last time I bought some.  But the sale flyer goes with me.  I plan to go to a couple of places I haven't tried before and also the place with the flyer. It is hard to not buy something I have on my list the first place I find it. Anyway, I know better to buy something on sale that I don't actually eat. So my plan is to get the stuff on my list sooner or later, but to check prices and maybe record them in my notebook.  I've tried to keep the receipts as they list the things I've bought with the prices but I toss them out before any type of analysis.
I do actually analyze the withdrawals from my checking account.  Now I've decided to analyze the expenditures for groceries and other consumable products.
This is already more planning than I have done in the past...just things on the list to buy has been it up until now.

Funny Guy

I've been using an audio deep sleep with medical hypnosis tape to help myself get to sleep.  I use a soft headband with speakers when I'm trying to go to sleep with this audio book.  I have been doing pretty well with it but last night my husband decided to fix my hair. It was totally dark and I have no idea what his goal was, but by the time he'd finished arranging my hair, the speakers were not in the right place and I was trying hard not to laugh.  Trying not to laugh only made it worse.  Then he wanted to know if I was listening to a funny tape.  He didn't understand that him trying to arrange my hair in the dark struck me as funny which made it even funnier.  It's really hard to get back in the mood to sleep when giggling off and on. It's the first time I heard the whole tape and started it back over.

Dremel with Audio

I can't listen to my iPod with the vacuum cleaner or lawn mower so I assumed I couldn't carve eggs with my dremel and listen. But today I tried it and without increasing the volume I was able to listen while I carved with the dremel.  That was amazing. I didn't really expect it to work without turning it up a lot and I didn't know if that would be enjoyable.

Erosion Wash

 Several years ago we piled brush over head high in this erosion ditch. It is filling in the ditch as the brush catches leaves and dirt filters in and stays. Sometimes the rain is so hard that it washes the whole pile of brush, but it all gets caught somewhere and fills in behind it.

This area has filled in pretty well.  We have a lot of places like this. It looks pretty messy, but it is doing what I read it would in the Permaculture book.

Breakfast at Cracker Barrel

Today we went to Nashville so Larry could see his endocrinologist. We left before six A.M. and ate breakfast at Cracker Barrel.  They've changed their menu and had steel cut oats with apples and cinnamon. The low-fat milk was the only bad part.
We took tuna salad and bread for our lunches. It was cheaper than eating out twice!

Looking for a Box

I pretty much hate to buy boxes.  I do, because I mail stuff off. But I have been looking for a box to mail some decorated eggs to Mama. All the boxes I could find were too big or too small.
Larry brought one out to my art room today.  He unpacked a box that had a hummingbird feeder in it.  Then he spread the box flat and reassembled it inside out.  It's perfect!

I trimmed two egg places off the ends of two cartons so they would fit in the box nicely. That will be twenty eggs. I thought I'd send her enough to share.

Time/Money

I'm trying to save money so I can pay the IRS. It takes me a long time to save enough.  Last year, for the first time, I had to borrow the money. It took forever to pay off the loan but I knew it had to be in less than a year because I'd have it to do again this year. So I'm trying not to spend much money so I won't have to borrow so much this year.
Hobbies are useful in that regard because spending money is really easy if I go somewhere. So I try to stay home.  This works out most of the time because I like being at home.  I finished making wash cloths today.

A yard of terry cloth wasn't expensive. I zigzagged the edges and tried to get the fuzzy bits off. The light creamy yellow is pleasant. I got a dozen wash cloths in a color I like, didn't spend much money, and it occupied some time.

When I don't want to spend money, it helps if I don't go anywhere. Seriously, I've sat in the car lots of times because I knew if I went in, I'd spend money. 

Washcloths

I got all my terry cloth cut into roughly wash cloth size and shape. I am now in the process of deciding if I have a bobbin the right size to put thread onto to stitch the edges. Hopefully I got rid of all the wrong sizes, but it is still iffy for me because they pretty much all look the same to me.

Porch

I don't know how long the weather will be suitable for my porch location, but today I started setting it up.  Wiping off the table, locating my extension cord, walking on the porch...today isn't the first day of spring, but it felt like it:) By evening I was wearing my cape again, but earlier it was sunny, calm, and pleasant.  I saw three deer in one of the fields.  The deer can obviously tell when hunting season is over.

Coupons

Today I went to JoAnn's Fabrics.  They had the Simplicity patterns on sale for $1 each! I bought a yard of cream colored terry cloth because I want to make washcloths.  Then I picked out a pattern for $1 and four yards of thin white material with thread for both pieces of fabric.  None of the stuff was expensive to that point.
When I lined up to check out, the woman in front of me in line asked if I had the coupons from the sales flyer.  I didn't.  She gave me one.
I don't usually pay attention to coupons because I don't go to places where I can use them very often.  But it was very nice to be handed one at the check out counter.
I went to Bath and Body Works with my coupons and used them.  This is probably the most coupons I've ever used in a year, much less one day.  I was very pleased with myself:) (and the kind stranger at the check out counter at JoAnn's).

Hair Cut

I got my hair cut today.  I have a picture of myself when I was about five with a style about like this one.  I didn't have all this gray in that picture though.

My Sleep Last Night

Last night I thought I would see if I could go to sleep without the audio tape.  If it is self hypnosis, I ought to still be able to do it, right? Wrong. Maybe later.

Hair Looks Nice

My hair is growing out.  I have an appointment for a trim tomorrow.  I hope it gets most of the perm. It looks awful.  Except Larry likes it.  I guess if only one person in the world thinks it looks nice, it is good it's him...he sees it the most.

Honeysuckle Leafing Out

Honeysuckle is beginning to leaf out we discovered as we rode through the woods today in the gator. We keep having rain. Last night we also had a thunderstorm to go with our rain.  But today was in the sixties so I didn't need piles of clothing to enjoy the ride. It was nice to see bits of green among our brown and grey surroundings.

Doctor's Visit

The doctor was very pleased with Larry's lab results.  My A1c had gone up but he was very comforting about it.  He said it wasn't good that it had gone up 0.4 but it was about the best that any of his diabetic patients had done between holidays and awful weather.

Audible Sale

I hardly ever get an audible book from the sales, but today I did so I have something new to listen to.

Usually

We've lived in Tennessee since 2000.  This is the first year I've gotten out my woolen cape I bought in Austria.  Usually it doesn't stay cold long enough or I'm not outside enough when it's cold.  I'm trying to walk some on the porch when it isn't raining sideways or trying to blow me away.  I've tried different combinations of clothing and today I added my long woolen cape.  It was still windy and even though I wasn't freezing, I didn't like being out in the wind even with the cape. But I might as well get some good from the wonderful cape.

More Sleep Observations

Last night I went to bed early (for me) and didn't take the over-the-counter sleep aid I've been taking with varying success for several years. I was afraid to stop taking it...what if that was an improvement over not taking it? But I went to bed at what I thought was a reasonable time and didn't take the otc sleep aid...and I went to sleep:) I am very pleased with the audio book. It refers to things in the book to read if I want to know more about something.  I don't have the book and thought about getting it but honestly, what I want to do is go to sleep not know more about it so I don't plan to buy the book.

Lab Work Again

I was anxious about the lab work...I always am.  Last time my blood sugar and cholesterol were both in the normal range.  This time my cholesterol was still good but my A1c was up a little. Christmas plus celebrating my good numbers was the problem, I guess.

Glad Yesterday Was Good

Well, yesterday was good, but today was a bummer.  The weather was cold, windy, and wet.  I went for lab work so that means I had to wake up earlier than I wanted to and leave without coffee. Eventually, two Aleve tablets and lots of coffee took the headache away but the weather was not under my control. My knee showed distress off and on.

Nice Day

The temperature got up to about 49 but it was sunny with only a slight breeze.  It was nice enough to walk on the porch for the first time in a long time.
We saw two deer, an opossum, and a rabbit. The deer were both good-sized females.  They took off running as soon as they noticed us, taking flying leaps across a pretty big erosion wash.

Good Night's Sleep

I downloaded an audio sleep book.  I've used it two nights in a row and I went to sleep and stayed asleep.  Today I actually woke up feeling like a human instead of a machine with practically dead batteries.  I don't know if it will continue to work for me.  I've used that combination of pajama headphones and iPod before with Enya and with a book with a calm reader and a story I knew well and liked.

I don't know why this is good.  Maybe anything nonfiction would work for me, but I have hopes this will continue to let me sleep.

The book promises several things besides getting to sleep. Guided dreams? Whatever it says about that I slept through.  

But being asleep and dreaming an awful dream that is so bad it wakes me up is terrible.  Going back to sleep and falling back into the same awful dream has happened to the point where I realized it was my dream and I didn't have to have that one.  Thinking of a substitute dream in that half-groggy state is tricky but not impossible.

The audio book also suggests creative dreaming to solve problems.  I haven't been awake for that part, either. I don't see how it would work because if I'm thinking of a problem, I think I wouldn't sleep. What has worked for me in that situation is thinking that the problem isn't at issue at that moment so just don't worry about it right now.  Worry later.

Audio Sleep

The sleep audio book wasn't what I thought it was going to be but I went to sleep during it so I guess it worked. It is supposed to tell how to use self hypnosis to heal, etc.....I slept through that part.  When I woke up it had gone on to David Eddings' Diamond Throne. I was pleased that my iPod held a good charge through the night.

Scarves at Auction

The two scarves I donated to the auction to raise money for the family whose house burned sold for $14 each.  Some of the things weren't bid on so they went on the table until there was enough stuff that people were willing to bid.  I've never been to an auction but I was glad the scarves sold.  The two auctioneers put the scarves on and pranced around in them.  They also commented on how nice they smelled:)  Yea, Febreze!

Sleep

I've downloaded an audio book that is supposed to help sleep.  This seems a reasonable purchase.  I've had a tape that was helpful, but I don't know where it is and if I found it couldn't play it...no cassette player any more.
I hope this one is as good.  I've tried listening to a story...but I just listen to the story.  I've tried listening to restful music.  It's nice, but it doesn't help me drop off.  I hope this is helpful.

Mess on the Floor

Today there was a transparent red mess on the floor.  There was one there when I volunteered a couple of weeks ago, too.  Last time I got housekeeping to get it up.  This time the head nurse saw it before I could report it to housekeeping.  She turned it in on a work order.  The maintenance guy was really unhappy about it and said somebody had spilled it.  I said to close the door.  He did.  I said it came out of the door closing box.  He said it would have run down the door.  It was a spill.  I got a paper towel, reached up to the screw on the bottom of the box.  It came away with a red imprint of the screw. 
So then he agreed it was from the door closing box and said we caused it to break because we keep the door propped open when we are there.  I said to leave it off if we're breaking it because we have to have the door open when we're there so people will know the gift shop is open.  We don't have to have a door closer...we can close the door pretty easily.
He said he would ask the boss.  I thought it was pretty bad that he fussed at the nurse for filling out a work order. I didn't so much care that he didn't believe me once she got him there. I was able to show him.

Our Wine

A glass of our wine!  It is a small batch this year but it is definitely good enough to make a bigger batch next year. It is dry which we intended as we are diabetic, but it has the flavor from the scuppernongs. I was worried that it wouldn't have any of the fruit flavor.

Coconut Ice Cream

I had the brilliant idea of adding coconut milk to my vanilla ice cream recipe.  I chilled it.  There was nothing like milk when I added it to the mixer.  It was mostly a solid chunk.  I wish I had squished the chunks into something smaller before adding it.  The small chunks were all right, but the consistency would have been nicer without the big chunks.  Live and learn.

Speculatus

I'm not sure of the spelling of speculatus, but we love them.  They are cookies and some have almonds (my favorite).  Larry found these and they look the same.  We haven't opened them and tasted them yet, but it is an exciting find:)

Not Sleeping

I'm really tired of not sleeping.  I'm tired or counting the chimes, hearing what time it is, and wondering how long I'll be in bed.  I know that I've read if I'm still asleep after half an hour I should get up.  But reasonably, I know I won't sleep when I'm up and I will obviously go to sleep in the bed so that is where I should be if I want to sleep.
Last night I went to bed about 11:30 and was still awake at two.  Then I had very vivid annoying dreams. Maybe tonight I'll sleep.

Not Enough Snow

This morning when I got up, snow covered the ground and was still swirling down.  I had high hopes for snow ice cream.  We didn't get enough and it soon began to melt.  I'm pretty convinced that wasn't snow ice cream is what kept us from having more snow.  We are supposed to have more snow Monday.  I should make sure I have enough splenda and half and half to ensure that we don't get much snow Monday.  I'll shop tomorrow.

Soup

Both of us like soup and several years ago I suggested to Larry that we plan on eating soup for dinner every night.  Neither of us objects to leftovers, and it takes the dither out of what to eat every day. It took a while to get to the point where I considered the soup "healthy." But Larry pointed out to me that this soup has no potatoes, corn, or barley. When he makes one that has high-carb ingredients, he has to eat all of it. It has Dreamfields pasta, kidney beans (the best carb choice), tomatoes we canned, okra we froze, and a ham slice. I'm sure he put some kind of seasoning, but it wasn't chili powder.

Today's Scarf

This is the scarf I started today. If I manage to finish it in time, I plan to donate it to an auction for a couple whose house burned. I don't know them but the woman is a friend of a friend.

It is nice to knit in lousy weather.  I can sit inside listening to an audio book and do something useful.

The weather is grey and dreary, but I have vibrant color to brighten my surroundings and the hope of helping someone who is worse off than I am.

Pony Tail Palm

This pony tail palm was given to Larry when the "foot" was about the size of a silver dollar. It is doing great in the sun room. A quarter is placed for size comparison.

Two Projects Finished

A dress and a scarf are finished.  I did a couple of scratched eggs, too, but they are still in the art room.

New Free Cell High

I have thousands of free cell games in the statistics on my Kindle so it is difficult for me to get a new high score or best time, although I got both within the last couple of weeks.  I'm currently on game 929 of straight wins though.  That is well over twice my last straight wins streak. I hope it is as good as word search for staving off dementia.  I really hate word search.

Money to Garbage

My fascination with gadgets means I turn money into crap sometimes.  I'm not a fan of stuff that doesn't work, so I hardly ever even try to use a guarantee...if I have something that doesn't work, chances aren't good that I'll want another one.
But my fitbit has been fun for me for about a year and a half.  It has stopped holding a charge.  I contacted them and found that their warranty is good for a year.  So obviously $100 for a year and a half usage is reasonable to them but not to me.  I'll keep using it until I have to stay connected to the base unit while it is plugged in to use it and then call it quits.  I will not be replacing it.

Bad Weather Pastimes

 Lots of pretty eggs are nice to have, but boring to do.  I can't listen to an audio book because the sound of the dremel is too loud.

 I crocheted embroidery thread and trimmed one pocket.  The other pocket has a butterfly outlined in fabric gold.

This scarf should be nice for Valentine's Day.  I'm not finished, but getting there.

Didn't Volunteer Today

The weather report forecast sleet between 9 and noon today so I stayed off the road. It didn't seem like sleet to me, but little frozen drips were on trees and bushes so it was icy.  We've had so much rain today that the fields are underwater. I don't plan to go anywhere tomorrow, either, unless I get my cleaning person at 1.  I don't know if the road between here and there is going to be all right, but it's only five minutes from here.

Same Stuff

Today I dyed a few more eggs.  I used the extra coffee pot.  It didn't hold many at a time, about four.
I didn't carve any today but I crocheted a chain of embroidery thread to use as decoration on a pocket.  Mostly I was curious about what a chain of crocheted embroidery thread would look like, and would it look all right as a trim.  It is all right, but not worth the trouble.  Unfortunately, I still need to do the other pocket or it will look bad.

Making Quiche

It was payday so I shopped for quiche ingredients.  Mushrooms come in packages larger than two so I decided to put some in a salad, and make two crustless quiches. They freeze nicely. I have everything I need.  So I decided it is a good time to make them as I have all the stuff.  It isn't very quick since I decided to blow the eggs needed for the quiches.

So I won't waste anything, I'll have breakfast, lunch, or whatever, and I'll have more egg shells to decorate.  I think I'll make these green.

I Think I Can...

I'm trying to sew a child's outfit.  I spent time today gathering the skirt and carefully matching the marks, and sewing the top back to the skirt back.  Then I spent time taking it apart.  I had done it with the seam to the outside. 
It takes me a long time to figure out how to do each step and I'm not all that good at it.  I may get better if I don't give up.  But I'm not sure I'll live long enough to get good at this.