AND HERE IT IS A NEW YEAR

 Hello, friends!  I know I haven't been around for quite a while.  The holidays are always so busy.  I hope you have been watching my YouTube channel and are all caught up on what is going on.

I thought I would share some pictures here and tell you a bit about what's been happening.

I did a lot of cooking and baking.  It has been a very cold winter and the stove going has helped to keep the kitchen warm.  Let me tell you this house is cold!  Much colder than my old house.  All of the windows leak cold air and the forced air heat is not as warm as radiators.  But we still like our house a lot.

 

This was dinner one night -- ham, green beans and sliced tomatoes.  Like my snowman mug?  We are so very grateful to my sister for the kitchen table and chairs she bought us.  For months we were eating off of TV trays in the living room.  It is so nice to have a working kitchen again.

I wanted to bake so many cookies, but got only two kinds done.  These are the sugar cookies.  The others were oatmeal craisin cookies.  I packaged them up and gave them to everyone in my Bible Study.  There were a few left and they were good.  I think I will make some sugar cookies this week.

We bought a new Advent wreath this year.  It is battery operated and the lights flicker like real flames.  With our cat George jumping on everything, we just felt this was safer.

I've been doing a lot of reading on my Kindle too.  I love to read and I'm glad I now have time to get back into it.  I've already finished two books this month and I started a third today.  I wanted to read at least 25 books this year and I think I will easily surpass that goal.

Joe bought some knit stockings at Target and we hung them for decoration.

Christmas was divided between my sister's house and our house.  I will tell you about that next time.

Hope you all had a lovely holiday season and are enjoying the new year.  See you soon.

Kathy

THE FIRST FIVE DAYS OF DECEMBER

 

Hello, friends!  And welcome to December.  It's hard to believe that this is the fifth day already.  To me the time just whizzes by.

I am doing my Vlogmas again this year over on my YouTube channel Kathy's Happy Home.  I know some of you also view me there and I hope you are enjoying them.  I think it is a little lame because not much is going on around here.  It is so cold that I haven't been going out.  I have cold induced asthma and I don't want to get an attack.  But I have to go sometime because i have to finish my Christmas shopping.  Next week it is supposed to be warmer so I will probably go then.

I have been fighting a stomach bug of some kind.  My stomach has been feeling as if it is doing the limbo.  Ha, ha!  I haven't wanted to eat much, of course, and have been drinking a lot of tea.  Today I was feeling some better, but after I ate lunch, it started up again.  *sigh*  Joe's veterans group is having a Christmas dinner this Saturday night and we are supposed to go.  I sure hope I feel better by then!

I can't find hardly any of my Christmas decorations.  And I have boxes full of them.  When I do find them, I will have to put them in totes and mark on the outside what they are.  I have enough fall decor for three or four totes, but nothing for Christmas.  Well, this is a strange year and I am working with what I have.  Next year will be better.

I have to get off of here and get some things done.  Or take a nap.  I think the latter.  See you all soon.  Hope you are enjoying the Advent season.

Kathy

THANKSGIVING

 Hello, friends!  I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving Day.  For those of you who are outside of the U.S., I hope your day was wonderful too.

It was a busy day for sure.  I didn't get to bed and to sleep until about 3:00 a.m.  And I got up around 7:00 a.m.  Not much sleep, but I had so much to do.

I spent the morning cleaning, doing dishes, and preparing some of the food ahead of time.  I got the turkey breast ready.  I tried a new recipe that sounded good.  I mixed several seasonings with some butter and put it under and over the skin before putting it into the oven.  Well, I was not impressed.  I think I will be throwing that recipe out and not using it again.  I don't think it added any flavor to the bird.  I will go back to my tried and true recipe of poultry seasoning and butter.  But if you don't try something new, you don't know if you will like it or not.

I was very tired by the mid afternoon, but went and picked up our friend Rosemary anyway.  She was going to be alone and we didn't want to see that happen.  She was very glad to be able to spend the day with us and have dinner with us.

I persevered through the next hour or so but my eyes started closing and I was TIRED!  So with the urging of Rosemary and Joe I went to bed for a couple of hours.  I felt so much better afterwards.  Joe went ahead and prepared the veggies for me which was so nice of him.  I took some pictures of the table and my plate, so let me show them to you.

We put out some snacks at first.  Cheddar and Monterrey Jack cheeses.

Grapes, pepperoni, celery and Mediterranean pita crackers.

See the fall plates I have?  They were from Dollar Tree several years ago.  I think they are so pretty.  We had Brussels sprouts, gravy, turkey (sort of hard to see, but it's behind the butter) and applesauce.

Here's a better view of the plates.  Mashed potatoes have been added to the table.

Stuffing and cranberry sauce too.

Here's my plate.  A bit of everything.

I made a pumpkin pie, but forgot to take a picture of it.  It turned out really good this year.  Rosemary had given us a bag of "Cherries and Berries."  I didn't want them to go bad, so I made a pie with them also.

We sat at the table after we ate for the longest time and finally around 9:00 p.m. Rosemary left for home.  Joe drove her and I cleaned some things up.  But a lot was left to do the next day.  I was beat.  It was a really great day, though.

I'm still working on cleaning out the living room so that I can put up the sofa.  Life will be so much easier when that is done.

I'm going to go for now.  But I will be back soon.  Can you believe tomorrow is December?

Take care,

Kathy