Sunday, November 21
Happy Birthday to Fred Epperly, our illustrious Sunday school teacher!!!
Sophie got here early enough this morning that we had time to feed Mother and still run by Big V to drop off some things and then get to the church in time for the fellowship breakfast. We haven’t been to the breakfast for several weeks and have missed getting to eat and visit with our friends out there, so this was a real bonus.
David delivered one of the best Thanksgiving sermons I’ve ever heard, a very clear and concise description of thanksgiving based on Psalm 100. If a person couldn’t find a reason to be thankful after hearing that message, he or she will just have to remain an ungrateful grump!
When the service was over, Barbara and I drove back to Holiday Villages for the afternoon, stopping first at the clubhouse to see if we could meet with a family that has recently moved to the park from Artesia. They contacted us through a Facebook posting that we had shared with the Holiday Villages staff and Barbara sent a note back that we would probably be in the clubhouse for lunch today if they had time to come meet us. I recognized the family name, but don’t know yet whether they are from the same tribe that I knew growing up in Artesia.
The family wasn’t there, but we did get to visit with Josh and Jackie a bit and get caught up on some of the latest news out there. Since nearly all of our time is spent in Mineola now, we are well behind the learning curve at the park.
After taking a brief nap in Big V, I got out and started clearing more briar vines. We haven’t been out there enough since January to stay on top of the “vine harvest,” so it was slow going to get some of them out of the trees. Still, it wasn’t as difficult as the first clearing efforts last year.
When Barbara got up, she got out the leaf blower and tackled the job of cleaning out around Big V. Even with the south side enclosed, we are getting a lot of leaves blowing through from the front to the back of the covered area, so the cleaning will be a constant job as long as leaves are still falling and the wind continues to blow.
Around 3:30 Barbara went back to the clubhouse and ordered lunch for us and I began putting tools away and getting myself cleaned up. By the time Barbara got back, I was showered and dressed in my church clothes, ready to eat and then return to Yantis for choir practice and another inspiring message delivered by David.
Monday, November 22
Today was just a basic workday around the house. After having breakfast and getting Mother settled in for her daily routine, I did yard work (mowing, trimming, raking, etc. while Barbara tackled the garage, doing some cleaning and straightening. It’s getting close to time to do something with Christmas decorations, and we will need some space to go through them before bringing them inside.
We spent time going over the menu for Wednesday’s family feast (Thanksgiving for the local family will be Wednesday since Cousin Angela has to work at the hospital on Thursday and intends to do some serious shopping on Friday).
After checking the list, we made another list of things we needed to complete the meal and trundled off to Walmart for our daily dose of painful experience. We could get the same amount of discomfort and frustration by staying home and shooting staples into our legs, but then we’d still have to go to Walmart for bandages (and they’d still be out of them), so we just suck it up and join the throngs to try to find what we need.
Tuesday, November 23
A week or so ago Alexander called us to as if we could attend the Grandparents Day program at his and Heather’s school in Dallas today. We checked the calendar and saw that it is clear, and told him we’d be happy to be there.
Heather explained that it would be a music program, with each grade level and the specialty choirs singing one selection each, with an hour or so allotted to the whole program.
So, we set about planning the trip, even to the point of dropping hints to Mother that it sure would be a nice surprise for Abby and Alexander if she came along to see them. After all, it’s only an hour or so over there and would get her out of the house for a bit.
After lots of hints and suggestions over several days, Mother and TJ both said they would join us for the excursion. We told Heather what we were planning and asked that she not tell Alexander and Abby so it would be a surprise when we all showed up together.
TJ’s wrist is still giving her fits, so she begged off yesterday to stay home and bake a couple of pies for tomorrow’s feast. She said we could take her car so Mother would be more comfortable, but we said we’d just take the Vibe because it’s much easier to get the wheelchair in and out of it. Besides, for that short a trip, the Vibe was comfortable enough.
We set the alarm and got up at 5:00 this morning, got ourselves ready and then got Mother dressed and ready to go by 7:15. All went smoothly for the first six blocks. It was then that Mother asked if anyone had picked up her purse, Evidently none of us had gotten the purse, so I turned around and went back to the house, got the purse, and we started off again.
Once we were inside, Heather and Abby met us in the auditorium where she had reserved seats for us. Abby was beside herself at seeing us, especially since Granny was along. We spent most of the time until 9:30 entertaining and being entertained by Abby. Abby is no stranger to cameras, so we got a lot of good shots of her; and, she even took some of us…another thing she likes to do when she’s with Grams and Gramps.
At 9:30 all was quiet in the auditorium as the program began and we began listening to each of the choirs perform. Now, I’ve got to say (and this may seem like sacrilege) that I’ve never been a big fan of concerts or programs that included everyone in the school, but this was undoubtedly the best rehearsed and behaved group of groups that we’ve ever seen or heard. Each grade level or specialty choir moved quickly to the stage, performed their song admirably, and then left the stage while the next group came up. When the kindergarten classes sang their number, Abby let us know that next year SHE would be up there singing. It was an absolute delight to hear the groups performing, especially knowing from our 35+ years of doing that sort of thing. The high school choirs just blew me away…they were better than most high school choirs I’ve heard or worked with…what a pleasure to watch those young people performing such marvelous music for their parents, grandparents, and classmates!
Of course, we have to admit that the choir we most admired was the first grade group with grandson Alexander. Alexander was all decked out in his concert finery and did a beautiful job of singing and presenting choreography as his group sang, “Super Turkey,” complete with hand motions and lots of expressions!
We then drove to a restaurant and met Heather and the kids for lunch before they returned home to finish packing for a family trip to Boston for the holidays and we started our return trip to Mineola.
As we got into town I noticed that the car was handling strange, so I pulled into a parking lot and got out to find that one of my brand new rear tires was quickly losing all its air. I had thoughts of trying to drive a block or so back to Walmart on it, but before I could finish the thought, the tire was completely flat.
There was nothing for Barbara and me to do except pull the wheelchair out of the back of the Vibe, uncover the compartment that holds the jack, tire iron, and the “donut” spare tire. I jacked the car up beside the flat tire and was working on the third lug nut when one of the store employees came out with a much better lug wrench and offered to finish the job. Within a few minutes we had the flat tire and wheelchair back in the car and the donut on the ground. The spare was way low, but that was to be expected…this was the first time since we bought the car in late 2004 that we had even opened that compartment.
As we looked around, we spotted a tire store right across the street, so we drove over there and ended up purchasing a used tire at a good price to get us back to Mineola, where I could return the damaged tire to the store where I purchased it. The folks at the tire store were wonderful, assisting me with getting everything out of and then back in the Vibe, mounting the spare tire, checking all the other tires for possible damage and air pressure, and then getting us back on the road, all under 30 minutes. The man who helped me said that they tried to do their best and I told him that if he did any better, I’d have to nominate him for sainthood!
The rest of the trip was uneventful, thank goodness, and we returned to the house around 4:00, happy that we went to see the kids, but very glad to be back home where we could rest and relax for the evening.
Wednesday, November 24
Today was family Thanksgiving Day at our place. We decided a couple of months ago that it would be much easier on everyone if we hosted the dinner here and prepared the turkey and ham and everyone else could bring some side dishes or desserts. We were prepared to have a sit down meal in the garage if enough people showed up, but when it was obvious that the count would max out at 9, we decided to just crowd around the table for the feast part of the day.
Barbara and I were up early this morning to get things underway for the 3:00 pm meal. While Barbara put together a schedule of when we would start each of our dishes, I put together the ingredients for a loaf of jalapeno bread and got the trusty bread maker fired up.
Our assembly line approach to cooking and baking worked beautifully, giving us enough time between dishes that we were also able to scrub the bathroom, dust the living room and hallway furniture, vacuum the living room, and sweep and mop the kitchen and dining room (a couple of times, as it turned out).
Barbara is great at planning this sort of event. She suggested that we set up a serving table for all the food, and another little table for dishes and silverware, leaving the tabletop for “eatin’ dishes.” The only thing wrong with the ideas was that there were so many serving dishes that there wasn’t room for all of them in the table, so some went on top of the kitchen bar, along with the desserts. Now understand, that was not a complaint…it became very obvious very soon that this family had a lot to be thankful for this year!
Since we didn’t have a centerpiece for the table, Barbara decided to scatter Scrabble pieces in the center and after each person filled their plate, they spelled out something they were thankful for…it was a simple way to focus our attention on the things we had to be thankful for. Initially, there were some basic rules, like no repetitions, but there was so much confusion as we moved through the line and found our places, that we just forgot the rules and enjoyed expressing our gratitude in this unique way.
By 5:30 we had the kitchen and dining room all cleaned and straightened and were emptying the dishwasher and preparing to put another load in it (there would be yet another load later tonight).
With the kitchen back in order and our guests gone, we settled in for a quiet evening, weary with well-doing, but with warm hearts from sharing a special day with family and friends.
Thursday, November 25
Happy Birthday to son Jimmy Clint Colwell in Lubbock, Texas!!!
Happy Birthday to daughter-in-law Carol Colwell in San Antonio, Texas!!!
Happy Thanksgiving, One and All!!!
“Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth. Worship the Lord with Gladness; come before Him with Joyful songs. Know that the Lord is God. It is He who made us and we are His; we are His people, the sheep of His pasture. Enter His gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to Him and praise His name. For the Lord is good and His love endures forever; His faithfulness continues through all generations.” – Psalm 100, a psalm for giving thanks
For us, this was Thanksgiving II, The Sequel. The difference was that we didn’t have a whole lot to do this morning, just do a little minor cleaning and straightening, but for the most part we just took it easy…had a good breakfast around mid-morning and then Barbara and I worked on getting the latest blog/journal ready for posting. Believe it or not, we are almost caught up after being so far behind for so long. Now that’s something to be thankful about!
Believe it or not, I’ve never been a fan of parades, so we didn’t turn the TV on until after noon, and then just to find a channel with some good background music.
We started putting dishes in the oven at 1:00 to slowly get them heated to a serving temperature without drying them out and by 2:30 we were ready to start the feast all over again.
We had only seven in the group today…Angela was on duty birthing babies at Trinity Saint Francis Hospital in Tyler and Addie went to Quitman today to have Thanksgiving with her cousin. The rest of us decided we could take up the slack and that was important, because one look at the serving table showed that we had hardly made a dent in all the food that was prepared for yesterday!
Again we spent an hour or so just enjoying each other’s company, sharing stories about various family members, and chowing down on delicious food…much of what Thanksgiving is all about.
The cleanup went smoothly as we divided up all the food and sent some home with each person. It had been good both times, but it was definitely time to get as much of it out of the house and spread the joy.
By 5:00 the house was cleared out and cleaned up and once again we spent an evening doing mostly nothing. Barbara played computer games and I watched football games…neither of us interested in doing anything of consequence.
Friday, November 26
Happy Birthday to son Mike Little in Richmond, Virginia!!!
We started our day by doing one of the dumbest things we’ve ever done (and have already promised ourselves that we’ll never even consider doing it again). We set the alarm for 4:15 and then drove over to Walmart to see what the Black Friday bit was all about.
In a little town like Mineola, I thought there might be 20 – 25 cars in the lot at 4:30. Imagine our surprise and dismay when we arrive to find a packed parking lot and long lines just inside the store.
Our goal was to get one of the 32” flat screen TVs that were advertised for Black Friday. Well, the line for the electronics department was wrapped all the way around the store and it was obvious that if even 5 % of the people wanted a TV, there would be no way that one would be available when we moved forward.
Barbara did a little scouting farther up the line and heard one of the store employees say that she didn’t understand why all those people were in line when they were already out of the Television specials. A couple of minutes later someone made the official announcement that the televisions were indeed, all gone (it didn’t make much sense at the time because the sale hadn’t even started, but the numbers did tell the story…6-8 TV sets and 400 people wanting them…I’d say it was a classic “bait and switch” deal, but there wasn’t much bait and there wasn’t anything to switch to.
We walked over to the electronics section just to see if anything else might grab our attention, but there wasn’t anything we even wanted to look closely at, so we returned to the car and drove back home, stopping first at the donut shop for a couple of fresh, hot apple fritters for breakfast.
We ate our breakfast and then napped until Mother woke and we officially started our day, ginning around to get all the “morning things” taken care of.
Sophie came over around 10:00 to stay with Mother and Barbara and I drove to Longview to look at a new bed for Mother. We’ve talked for quite a while about finding a bed that has electronic controls to raise and lower the head and foot sections. We had talked to Mother about how this could be much more comfortable for her than the 30-year old bed she’s now sleeping in. Another consideration is that with a new bed, I won’t have to strain my back to pick her up to get her seated correctly when she wants to sit in bed and enjoy her morning coffee and newspaper. We had explained that we got a flyer in one of the newspapers and just wanted to get information, and she said that was a good idea.
We drove straight to The Mattress Firm in Longview and were warmly greeted by their employees (actually, by one of the owners, we later found) who gave us the grand tour of the selection of beds. We explained about Mother’s age and the Parkinsonism, and then took a close look at one of the Temper-Pedic double beds. (She has to have a double bed so there’s room for the puppies to sleep with her!) We were told to lie down on the bed and the lady ran it through it’s range of positions…it wasn’t long before we were sold on it. I wanted to give it a 24-hour sleep test right then and there, but we had other things on the agenda.
After getting the full spiel, we asked the price and were pleasantly surprised that the mattress setup, bed frame, pads, sheets, and pillows were about half the price we expected. We called TJ (who just happened to be at Mother’s house at the time) and told her about the deal. She quickly conferred with Mother and then told us to seal the deal, which we did as soon as possible. It will take a week to ten days to get everything in and delivered, but we feel certain Mother is going to be enjoying a wonderful new sleep experience!
TJ told us later that she mentioned to Mother that not only would this be much more comfortable for her, but it would also help save Jim’s back, to which Mother replied, “Well, he’s not going to be sleeping in it!”
When we left the store, I drove Barbara to one of the I-20 exits to Longview and dropped her off to join her sister Carol and Connie, one of Carols’ daughters. Carol came to Shreveport for the holidays since her son Gary and his family live there. She and Barbara decided that by Friday, Carol could leave all the kids (bunches of hers came to LA, too) and take advantage of a free room at the SpringHill Suites and enjoy a sister’s weekend. We switched all of Barbara’s things to Connie’s car, said our hellos and goodbyes all around, and then I returned to Mineola while the girls headed east to Shreveport and Bossier City.
Barbara: The trip to Louisiana with Carol and Connie was really great because we found lots of things to talk about and the time just flew by!
Once in Bossier City, Connie drove us to Gary’s where I grabbed my trusty camera and began shooting away. The first collage I made shows Gary and Tish and their family. The little one in the middle photo is their granddaughter, Lexy.
After unpacking the car and claiming our territory in the room and a little photo taking, the 3 of us decided to go over to the casino to try our luck for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes of play, one can get tickets for a free buffet which sounded like a deal to us since we were going to play anyway.
Eventually, we called it an early night and went to the room to kick back, check email, etc., etc., etc.
Saturday, November 27
Jim: For my part, this was a pretty lazy day. I started by getting out all the ingredients for a loaf of homemade Russian rye bread. I’ve been planning for today’s lunch – grilled beer brats on dark rye bread…my mouth has been watering all week just thinking about it!
Once the mixture was in the machine and churning around, I started in with some minor cleaning. The house was in good shape, so it didn’t take much to touch it up for the weekend.
When the cleaning and straightening were done, I spent an hour or so shaping up my part of this edition of the journal/blog. Since Barbara would have to fill in with her activities for yesterday and today, I knew this wouldn’t be the week that we got totally caught up on our production schedule, but I wanted to be as close as possible.
About 1:45 I fired up the grill and when the coals were just right, I set the brats out to slowly smoke and simmer…what a great aroma! While the brats were grilling, I heated up a batch of red beans that TJ brought over this morning…added in some chunks of ham left over from Thanksgiving dinner…wow, we were going to eat like royalty today!
TJ came over a little after 3:00 and before we got Mother to the kitchen we watched al little of the webcast of the Artesia Bulldogs and Goddard Rockets semi-final playoff football game. Goddard has knocked Artesia out of the playoffs the past two years and was heavily favored to win today’s game and the state championship game next week, but someone forgot to tell the Bulldogs that their season was over. After playing to a 21-21 tie at the half, Artesia came out with a fired-up defense and a hot offense and ended up beating the so far undefeated Rockets to earn a home field advantage for the New Mexico AAAA state championship game next week against Aztec.
Unfortunately, the weekend was not so kind to our other orange and white teams as Texas went down with a resounding thud and the local Mineola Yellowjackets took a thumping from New Boston, ending their playoff run.
After lunch, I got the kitchen leaned up and then settled in for an afternoon and evening of football on TV until it was time to get Mother ready for bed and then go iron some shirts and slacks in preparation for my trip to Shreveport tomorrow morning.
Barbara: Carol and I were both stunned to find that we slept til 8 AM this morning, even though we had gone to sleep around 9:30 the night before. Go figure…we must have been tired! Anyway, neither one of us were in a hurry to get moving though we did want to make it to breakfast before it shut down. Also, Carol wanted to do some laundry so while she headed to the wash room, I stood in line to fix our waffles. This place does a stunning business and no one wants to miss out on their waffles, sausage, eggs, etc., etc., etc. breakfast. Just about the time I made it to the waffle machines and poured in our batter, Carol joined me which was great since trying to fight the crowd with two plates could be hazardous!
After breakfast, we both took turns handling the camera…Carol had given me a shirt for my birthday tomorrow that I absolutely love…it’s emergency numbers to call when one is feeling a certain way. For example, “If you are worried…call John: 14.”
After eating, we headed for the car and the store so we could find Gary’s youngest, Sierra, who turned 5 in the middle of the month, a birthday gift. Sierra informed everyone in her family that they would celebrate her birthday this year during Thanksgiving when Grandma (Carol) and all of her NM family were there!
When we arrived at the house at 3:00, we found that Sierra had been confined to her room until all party preparations could be handled.
Before calling it a night though, Connie, Carol and I once again tried our hand at the games. Since they were leaving tomorrow morning though, we once again called it an early night.
“There is one day that is ours. There is one day when all we Americans who are not self-made go back to the old home to eat saleratus (baking soda) biscuits and marvel how much nearer to the porch the old pump looks than it used to. ... Thanksgiving Day ... is the one day that is purely American." - O. Henry, American writer, quoted for Thanksgiving in the U.S., Nov. 25, 2010
Hoping that you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving,
Jim/Dad/Gramps & Barbara/Mom/Grams
