Goodbye 2009

I can't believe it is nearly a week since Christmas. Where has it gone? We haven't done much in that time though I have spent some time in my craft room. I have a couple of birthday cards to make for January, and yesterday I put the finishing touches to the memory/scrapbook I have been making for Ben. I gave it to him with just five pages in it on his 21st birthday. He will be 23 in February and keeps asking when it will be ready. So now it is. I have had such fun making it and now I am ready to move on to similar ones for Jonathan and Tom. I don't think I have so much material for theirs though. Ben was involved in so many activities and clubs, and did well in all of them so I had plenty of photographs, but I have quite a folder full for the others as well, so I'm sure I'll manage something for them.

I have also done some more of my lace. I got myself into a right pickle with it before Christmas, but this week I have painstakingly undone quite a length of it, and I am now back on track. I bid for, and won, some lacemaking equipment on ebay. Unfortunately the seller only posts to UK, so I had to have it sent to Michael's address, and he will forward it on to me. Lace making is done here too, of course, but supplies are not easy to find. Ocasionally they have special lace-making days where you can buy some things, so I shall try to go to one this year. In the meantime I hope what I have bought is in good condition, and I shall use that.

The Wii fitness game is fun though I am not very good at it. My hand-eye coordination is useless so the controls sometimes baffle me, and balance and stamina are both things I need to practice and improve on. But it is easier to make a fool of yourself in the privacy of your own home, and there's a comfy chair to sink into when you need to stop. So hopefully we will both benefit from using it regularly, and have some fun at the same time.

Our post office reopened for a few days between Christmas and New Year and we got some more cards that didn't quite make it in time. It was nice to hear from Chris' family in America. We haven't seen them since we went out to Arizona for our twenty-fifth anniversary in 2004. We also got Ben's card which gave us a good laugh. (He posted it on 17th Dec and we received several posted after that date, but his must have got to the bottom of a pile, and didn't quite make it to us before the Post office closed). His cards had two badges on it, "Most marvellous Mum" and "Super cool Dad", and he said we had to promise to wear them and put a picture on my blog, so here we are, enjoying the mid-day sunshine out on the back porch.

When the wind blows in UK it usually has a chill factor that makes quite a difference to how you feel when you have to go out in it. Here that can also be true, but we also have 'hot wind' and that is what we have today. We woke up to hear my windchimes nearly taking off the wall, and various things hurling about in the yard. But when we took the dogs for their run it was almost like being in the track of a powerful hair drier. It wrenched the car door out of my hands as I opened it and nearly took it off its hinges, and it was all I could do to walk against it, but we were too hot in our little light jackets and ended up carrying them and walked along in just a tee-shirt, (and trousers of course!). The dogs still had a good race around but Miki didn't like walking back to the car when it was blowing straight towards us. It is blowing more gently now and the sun is shining brightly so it is a lovely day. I was so glad to get some washing out yesterday. I had to double peg everything, but by the time the second load was washed, the first one was dry. The week before Christmas was the first time since we have been here, that I hadn't been able to dry my washing outside the day I did it. Although I inherited a tumble drier with the house, I have no intention of using it, but we really have nowhere suitable to dry clothes inside. But after a week of rain, we were running out of some things so on Christmas Eve I did an emergency wash and we ended up with undies hung like decorations on every hook and ledge in the guest bathroom. It took them nearly four days to dry! so it was with some relief that I got the rest all done and packed away again yesterday.

Now all that is left is for me to wish all my readers and followers a happy, healthy and peaceful 2010. Let's hope the economy picks up a bit, the unemployed find work, and the tension everyone seems to be living under these days will be eased. Happy New Year everyone!