Communist Take Over & This & That

   I don't do politics but I am stunned with all of the communist wins. What are "they" teaching our students?  Whom ever the President is - they usually lose congress in the mid-terms-a historical fact. Bit this opens the door now to a communist president-scary stuff.

  The weather is till pretty warm here in Missouri  considering we are in November now- we do still have a few warm days before the next big temperature drop-which comes this Friday. So I will need to bundle up as we are spreading  my husband's ashes in the lake off of a boat then  A small gathering of close friends and his sister and family. She lives in northern Illinois and is coming in today to help me with some things. This has been a difficult week so far. I am making myself eat so  not to lose any more weight. Stress and sadness s very rough on the body. It must eat up one's body weight. I am making myself eat more food then just breakfast and a main meal around 2 pm.

  How is your weather? Enjoy autumn we are finally getting some colors in the leaves now.

Found this photo online, looks close to what I have here

  

Making a Quilt

  A couple days ago I decided I wanted to make a rag quilt for Larry's niece-who just loved Larry . 

    I have made quite a few of these jean quilts to gift friends over the years-back in the 90's or so. This is how I made that huge jeans quilt. I want to make this as a lap quilt for watching tv etc for her.  

    I need 108 6 inch square block "sandwiches". I will be cutting for the top and the back and will add batting in between. Cutting out 6 inch squares is a project for sure. Larry didn't have that many jeans but have all of those cut now-using scissors not the rotary cutter. Next up will be cutting up shirts and one sweater, I did just look for patriotic flannel on Etsy to cut up the squares for the back of the "sandwich"

     I am not sure I will have enough clothing for the top of the quilt yet-if not will add in some of the flannel fabric that I am using for the backs.  I found this tutorial These quilts are easy to  make and always loved the results   I have hand embroidered on some of them-which is a challenge. They usually make a big X to sew the sandwich together-I have also used hearts or stars instead.   I think I will look for flannel with wolves on it too-as our wolf Nikita was so much apart of our family for many years-she was such a gentle soul.

  I needed to go to town on Thursday to drop off packages at ups-going back to amazon, and get a few items at the local grocery store. I got very ill was sooo  not ready to be out in public yet.  So this quilt is a good project for me right now, also spin yarn a bit, and read books.

 Enjoy your weekend-we finally have  little fall like weather-we have been so spoiled here with perfect warm weather still

Sharing some photos I found online

 

So if you have a sewing machine and old jeans and flannel shirts-you can do this haha if you want one-they are so comfy love them

Update: I also wanted to share a gift that new friends brought over for me last night=it was something  really needed too-a hug in a box They live up on top of a steep hill that is in the middle of the circle road where  I live. 

(all photos will enlarge just click on them)

  i had never seen a gift like this before-a soft cuddly blanket, bag of dried lavender, heavy ceramic mug, a candle, bath salts Dried bouquet of flowers on top of box-very thoughtful and much appreciated and needed this last night Also a  rock with  a quote-"one day at a time".  This was so special and we just recently met them this summer  I will enjoy their friendship going forward. They are homesteaders with a few chickens-I can help them with that-as for a lot of years Larry and I raised most all of our food-veggies, beef, pork, chickens, geese. goats for meat milk and cheese  We also had bee hives too. I preserved most all of our own food for years. 

Something New to Learn & Life Going Forward

   You all will probably be laughing or shaking your heads-but my Sister-in -Law is insisting I now need a cell phone. Ha Ha

   I will just take over Larry's phone and number but his phone is old and needs an upgrade. So I just bought an older Samsung model so it would just be the yearly charge for the service.  If I were to buy there newest model I would need to also pay a monthly fee in addition to the yearly service fee. No thank you. I really have no use for a cell phone as I am home most of the time. Now being alone in the world-sigh-I can see I need a cell phone in the car. I am hoping learning to take photos will be easy too-and hopefully better as well.

   I had been buying Larry a Tracfone ever since we bought our retirement woods property back in 1999. Wow that sounds so long ago now. I had insisted he needed to have a cell phone then during the long drive from the Wisconsin-Illinois line down to SW Missouri area. It did come in handy for him.

  My sister in law's husband will teach me how to use it when they come down next week.  She is helping me find a boat service with a captain to spread the ashes in the lake. I am not putting anything at all in the newspapers for my own safety. and just informing a handful of nearby friends.  

   I was so grateful that one of my neighbors came down for a long weekend to get their lake home ready for winter. They were so supportive. The 24th was by birthday and she baked up a small cake-sadly she didn't know I needed gluten free for my celiac. That was just so caring of her though.

  Early on the 25th Larry had passed. The stress situation was that the hospice nurse on call over the weekend lived 3 hours from me and didn't arrive til almost 1 pm so that would have been difficult if my friends had not come down-they stayed with me til the nurse arrived and the nurse called the funeral home..

   Back in the '80's during a 4 month period I lost my little sister to a head on car crash, then both Grandma's soon after, and then an uncle. So I have not gone to funerals since then 

  My sister in law is already talking that I must move to a condo or something smaller with no steps or hill-No way, I feel very safe here, still rural and there are good neighbors here on this circle road on the lake. Too soon to make any decisions. She is also wanting to talk me into staying with her and her family at her Florida home on the beach. Found out her home there is 10 minutes from my Wisconsin friends rental-where they stay in the winters now. I don't think I am up to that either.  Someone told me I need 6 to 8 months to adjust.

  Some how my husband's military records can not be found, and for some reason he has never kept a copy of his honorable discharge papers-I have never seen them ever. I was looking into this for the flag and possibly the ceremony as he did a lot in the Viet Nam war. The lady at the funeral home told me there were a lot of records destroyed in a fire years ago.

  When my sister in law and her family get down here next week (they have a lake house here too about 30  minutes away)-she will help take the suburban in to trade for a new car for me-looking at the Equinox 2027   So a big week coming up. Perhaps too many changes-but I need a new car before winter.

  I am working on relaxing if I can, spinning yarn, reading a book, etc. Today is a little bit better. We had been married for 44 years but had been together for 46 years. When I look back we had a good life together.

  Did you get a good view of the full hunter's moon? It was spectacular here out my window over the lake. Hoping the camera on the phone will help me take better photos.  Found this photo online-at Lake in the Ozarks Pretty much how it looked out my window.

This & That

 

I will be in mourning for awhile

Happy Weekend

   October seems to have flown by so fast this year. Not sure why either. Today is my birthday-not a happy one this year though. I am 77 now-had to do the math haha as I never really paid attention to my age over the years-except when I turned 50 and then 65-those were milestone type birthdays.

  We continue with the warmer weather-high in the 80's during the day and 50's for night time-not bad at all for autumn.

 This is the first time I asked for a mail in ballot for the upcoming election-Larry was able to vote with me helping him as well. Missouri had no key races this time, but they had a long list of Missouri constitutional amendments to consider.

  I have really used Amazon Prime a lot this month-I can't get out of the house now so that service has been very helpful. Not fresh items but I have plenty of frozen fruits and vegies.

  We have had very little rain here, so where I live on the lake very little fall colors. Usually looking out our wall of windows the colors can be beautiful. I did find this video of a state park nearby- Ha Ha Tonka

 This is a video I found taken last year at this park. We have walked some of the trails there-a gorgeous area.

 Enjoy your weekend

Good Morning

   Found this on Facebook

Decided to Make Fudge

   I saved a fudge recipe this week from Big Man's World, so decided to make it.

Very simple-no sugar

  2 cups chocolate chips no sugar-I used dark chocolate chips no sugar

 1 cup almond butter-nothing added

1 tsp vanilla extract.

  recipe said 10"x10" pan-I had a 9"x9" pan that was perfect. I think the 10" would be too big.

Melt the chocolate and almond butter either stove top or microwave add the vanilla stir-pour into pan and refrigerator. 

Back in 2009 I was making my own extracts These are well aged now and the vanilla is soooo good-like a more expensive vanilla extract.

Will see how this sets up.

Update: chocolate set up-had to give it a taste--soooo good would make again I probably need to freeze most of this so I don't eat too much-smiles

 We are beginning with gorgeous weather today that will last awhile. I so need to work outdoors but at this point I need to be near my husband in case he needs me. The hospice nurses are coming every day now-they have been so helpful and supportive.

  Hoping your weather is awesome too