Rayen

Yes, the happiest day of the year has finally arrived. Much as I love Christmas, December 26th is the day on the calendar that is farthest away from the next visit by Santa. I can breathe a sigh of relief and not think about all that good luck, good times and good cheer that I love so much for a whole 365 days, starting today. Okay, the sarcasm is mean, I admit. Before you judge, you should really read some of the holiday hell stories on my blog. They are not for the faint of heart . I think I will celebrate by taking my guy out for lunch. Our neighbors gave us a Culvers gift card, and I do love their shrimp. :) Image by Rosy / Bad Homburg / Germany from Pixabay

May your Christmas be merry, bright, and incident free!

Last week my guy and I visited to the local no-kill cat shelter to make a donation and visit with the kitties. This has become an annual tradition for us, and one of the few bright spots of our holidays this year. To see more pics, check out my album here. We also go to honor the memory of our cats Jeri and Jak, whom we lost to old age many years ago. The cats at this shelter are for the most part abandoned pets, strays or feral, and many are in rough shape. They are treated by a vet, looked after by staff and (if appropriate) made available for adoption. The shelter just built a new building which has become a separate facility for elderly cats so they can live comfortably. It's very humbling to go and sit with the kitties. Many are friendly and will come up to me for a head scratch, even some that are recovering from injuries or neglect. Others want nothing to do with us and run. On our visits we offer attention, and money, but it's the folks who run and...

Since I've decided to have a no-spend year next year in order to deal with the 148% hike in my health insurance premiums due to the government's utter ineptitude with dealing with that situation, I'm giving myself permission to thrift whatever I want until the end of 2025. Which starts with this interesting lot of yarn in a neat vintage container. That yarn looks pricey to me. There's a Noro tag on one of the skeins that looks to be fingering weight; Noro yarn runs over $10.00 per skein retail. I'm currently using a basket to hold skeins for whatever crochet project I'm working on, and the darn thing keeps giving me splinters and snagging the yarn. This metal container will be much better. Stay tuned to the blog to see what it looks like when it arrives. :)

After watching Glass Onion a few years back I decided to give the sequel Wake Up Dead Man a go. I'm not in love with Benoit Blanc, the supposedly master detective character, and the cast of characters from the first film were very unlikeable, but I did think the writing was okay. This sequel is star-studded and filled with a lot of religious hoopla, both downsides for me, but what the heck. It's Christmas! The premise: a former boxer and currently disgraced young Catholic priest is sent to a remote parish where the old priest in charge is chasing off his congregation with his fiery and highly prejudiced attitude. From the beginning the old priest takes a strong dislike to the young one, and does everything he can to patronize and alienate him. The old priest also has a bizarre control hold on a small group of his most loyal parishoners, all of whom seem to be worshipping him instead of God. Then the old priest is murdered in the middle of mass, and everyone decides t...

This little cobbled together utility quilt that came in the trio lot is actually really sweet; the original maker may not have known how to piece but still put a lot of work in it. I'm going to use it as a mat for under my home office computer chair, so I laundered it and it held together beautifully. There are a few seams that have popped or torn that needed to be sewn down. What was used for batting migrated and bunched in one corner, so I decided to remove that. The batting was cobbled together, too, and included part of an old flannel blanket. This is what made up the bunch in the corner. I repaired the seams that needed it, and the quilt went to join my other utility quilts in the closet.