respublica

It was one of those seasonal days

Yesterday was on the weird side. Dale left with some seminary students, faculty and one of our grandsons for Iowa for a few days at Mission Central. The weather did not sound great going that way, but they plugged on and did make it. But not before being slowed down because of this:

Nasty weather. But today they said it was clear so that's good.

While they were driving I felt it was past time to take down our Christmas tree and all the other Christmas items sitting around the house. Without Dale here I wasn't sure I could haul our big tree outside by myself so after giving thought to just taking off the lights and ornaments and then waiting until Monday when he is here to get the tree out, I got the brilliant idea to cut off the bottom branches. That would make it easier to get it outside. And so it was. I not going to say it was physically easy, but it worked.

It went from this:

To This:

This was a big tree with wide bottom branches. After getting all the lower branches clipped off there were needles everywhere and piles of limbs to toss out, but still much easier than wrestling with the entire tree.

Today I'll get the rest of the things into the Christmas closet which involves trooping up and down the stairs. As much as I loved Christmas things around, it's also great to have them put away. Things are much less cluttered feeling, like I can breath again.

45 years of banning words

Lake Superior State University in Michigan has for 45 years published a list of words banished for over-use, mis-use, and general uselessness.

Here are this year's words they want banned with their category:

Word or phrase most nominated:

Quid Pro Quo

Words that attempt to make something more than it is:

Artisanal, curated, and influencer

Words Banished for Pretentiousness or Imprecision:

Literally, I mean, Living my best life, Mouthfeel

Those Darn Millennials:

Chirp, Jelly (slang for jealous), Totes, Vibe, OK Boomer

 

 

Happy New Year Everyone!

2020 a nice round number. Our day is going to be a quiet one, but we always watch the Rose parade and wait for the Lutheran Hour Ministries float. It's the 9th float this year and 20th group in the line-up. Hallmark Channel without commercials. In St. Louis that channel on Charter Spectrum is 736.

Christmas!

We had one of those Christmases when everyone was in a good humor. The boys had fun, the parents didn't have to watch them every minute, the dinner was easy and the weather was sunny and warm. Nice day. I'll admit Christmas dinner prep and clean-up was so much physically easier than Thanksgiving. No turkey on Christmas, we had a big beef tenderloin roast which I got at Schnucks and used all the store rewards points I'd been saving since this summer. Schnucks customer rewards is one of the best store rewards of all of them. The points given each time you shop add up to real dollars taken off your bill at check-out.

Here is a quick look at family this year.

Katie and Charlie's two boys, Drew and Jake. Perfect poses.

Lizzie and Darren's boys, Christian, Nick and Connor. Also perfect poses.

My sister sent me this painting of Ferdie she had made and it made my day.

Katie got into the Ferdie memories as well with this wine glass.

Connor wanted another giant bear for Christmas. 3 of our grandsons love the big bears and have bedrooms full of them. So I couldn't help myself, it's such a sweet thing. I rather like cuddling up with them myself.

 

After the day ended Dale and I took a walk through the campus to see all the Christmas lights. It was quiet and calm.

A line for the ages

This is the line at Kruta's Bakery in Collinsville this morning.

Unreal  Glad we went yesterday

Tiny Town in the snow

The nice part of the weird snow we got yesterday was it makes Dale's Tiny Town look more seasonal.

Beautiful church scene

Our church has a lighted glass case on the back wall which gets new displays depending on the season. Currently a very pretty Christmas scene has been created.

Christmas picture of the day 4

This is a photo of downtown Chicago taken by outstanding photographer, Barry Butler.

Christmas picture of the day

This was taken several years ago when we had snow. I think it was 2013. Yes it was, right around this date.

Oh the hours we spent

While I was pondering what type of garland or even no garland to put on our Christmas tree this morning, I got to thinking of all the things we did over the years when the kids were growing up. We'd see some interesting idea on TV, like Martha Stewart, and decide to try it. Funny how things look so simple when expert crafters do something.

We strung popcorn on a string to make an old fashioned garland. That was a mess, but we hung the strings anyway. The popcorn kept breaking apart when the needle went through.

We made cranberry Christmas wreaths which mean getting a styrofoam wreath, bags of fresh cranberries, and several boxes of toothpicks. The toothpicks had to be cut or broken in half, pushed through a cranberry and then stuck onto the wreath. This took hours and wreaked havoc on the fingers. But it was pretty cool and we did that for several years. We were masochists.

Then during a year when sweet gum balls were just covering the yard, we gathered a million of them up and hot glued them to a styrofoam cone. Then spray painted it. This project was the first and only time I bought a glue gun.

Needless to say, those days are gone and I say that with some regret.