Thankful & other November Happenings

Thankful that (Aunt) Sharon &
Granny love me, favorite 
Thanksgiving food was the turkey 
treats (scotcharoos).

Hello there Adventurous Friends, greetings from South Dakota.  How you doing?  I intentionally thought about everyday things to be thankful for this month according to the activities going on for the day.  The Grands shared their thankful things & favorites of the Thanksgiving holiday.  They all looked so pretty & handsome dressed in their Sunday clothes on their way to church.  I texted with the older Grands most everyday about thankful things.  That was an enjoyable activity this month within itself.

This is Sentence a Day where I join others & write a little something about each of my days, wrote in a long drawn out sentence or 2.  This month's sentences includes a thing I was thankful for each day.

* Mon 1st - Lions club meeting, talked about the world series fundraiser board, Christmas dinner & having a gun show maybe in the spring, ate at #3, thankful for friends to laugh with.

* Tues 2nd - Thought it was Wed, changed the sheets on the bed, off work early, did a couple loads of laundry, wrapped some more of Grands Christmas presents & got a box ready to mail, thankful for soft comfy flannel sheets.

Not yet sure what Thanksgiving
is all about, but she sure is 
adorable wearing that big bow.

* Wed 3rd - Read, watched videos, emailed & calculated to set a date for minimum age retirement coming up sooner than later I'm hoping, thankful for a career that has provided decent wages & good benefits through the years.

* Thurs 4th - Gas, groceries, bill paying day, thankful for good tasting food & clean water. 

* Fri 5th - Ordered Christmas dresses for the Grandgirls & shirts for the Grandboys, thankful for Rose (a pet) to go on walks with on nice sunny days like today.

Watching the muskrats swim at sunset.

Week 45

* Weekend 6th & 7th - Kevin mulched leaves with the mower, the air smelled so good, fresh cut grass is one of my favorite smells, camped over in the buttes, did some trail riding & had a picnic, thankful for a handyman husband that could fix the camper rig when all the batteries were dead.

Exploring the area around camp.

Detours & gravel roads while 2
new bridges are being built.

* Mon 8th - Off work early, marked things off to-do list - vacuum, wrap baby gifts, cook spaghetti for supper; thankful for tax dollars at work as I drove over one of the new bridges.

* Tues 9th - Off work early 2 afternoons in a row, got gas & groceries since Thursday my day of doing those things is a holiday, made cheesy tators to go with leftover spaghetti for supper, gathered the years pictures in a folder to make a book, thankful for patience as I was stopped & waited for 3 semis to make their way through the 1 lane construction zone.

* Wed 10th - Full day of work getting everything caught up the day before a holiday, thankful for inspiring & motivational bloggers as I received an Awesome Prize from Far Side in the mail from her Snow Stick contest.

* Thurs 11th - Listened to the wind howl, set the timer for 30 minutes of blog reading in-between laundry & cleaning, thankful for veteran's public service.

* Fri 12th - Went to church pancake supper, thankful for being able to participate in local fundraisers to help aid the community.

Week 46

* Weekend 13th & 14th - Went camping up at the pond, watched a couple favorite Christmas movies - Christmas Card & A Holiday to Remember, wrapped & boxed the rest of the Christmas gifts on hand, thankful for supplies to wrap Christmas presents having joy & blessings thinking about the reason for the season.

Thankful for strawberry &
chocolate milk, favorite
Thanksgiving food was the
pumpkin cake that said 
Give Thanks.

* Mon 15th - Lions club meeting, meal at #3, next meeting is the Christmas potluck dinner, spoke up to bring mashed tators & gravy, thankful to have the opportunity to be a member of a service club that does activities to serve the community.

* Tues 16th - Finalized Friday's work baby shower preparations, boss mentioned the shower was also for one from another office, thankful for having another baby gift item on hand being the season for gift giving. 

Thankful for Nana sending us
presents each Christmas, favorite
Thanksgiving food was Aunt's
Mac & cheese.

* Wed 17th - Coworker on Covid quarantine leave, no more afternoons off early for a couple weeks, thankful for good health not having to miss work.

* Thurs 18th - Got gas & groceries, needed cookie mix for the baby shower & milk for my coffee, thankful for convenient shopping for everyday items in our small town with population 380.

* Fri 19th - Up early making cookies for the shower, everyone wrote down their predication when the baby would be born, I predicted December 15th, thankful to share a good time at work with coworkers setting aside drama & animosities. 

Setting up the baby shower area at work.  

Week 47

Happy Birthday to Grand Olivia

* Sat 20th - Facetimed with Daughter & Grands, got introduced to Rosie their new guinea pig, Grands talked about what they wanted for Christmas, bingo night, took container of leftover cookies for snack sharing, thankful for electronic gadgets to be able to keep in contact with family when they are far away.

* Sun 21st - Shopping in Rapid, chicken biscuit for breakfast, butterburger for lunch/supper, thankful for freedom to enjoy a beautiful morning ride & a day of life doing things we want to do.

Thankful for the fact that our
family is so successful, favorite
Thanksgiving food was Aunt's
Mac & cheese.

Thankful for my family, favorite
Thanksgiving food was the ham
or pumpkin pie.

* Mon 22nd - Long busy exhausting day at work, pregnant coworker having contractions, thankful for coworkers going above & beyond their regular duties to help out. 

* Tues 23rd - Mailed Moma's Christmas box, pregnant coworker in hospital to halt contractions, too soon for baby to be born, thankful for prayers & modern medicine.

Thankful to go to church on Sunday
& getting to play football during
the week, favorite Thanksgiving thing
was Granny's classic biscuits & jelly &
Thanksgiving practice listening to
Christmas music.

* Wed 24th - Got the rest of the Christmas gifts wrapped, boxed, labeled & ready to mail, thankful gift wrapping is done & thankful pregnant coworker came home from the hospital & probably on bedrest till baby is born closer to due date.

* Thurs 25th - Happy Thanksgiving, spent the day cooking with Kevin in between watching the Macy's parade & Hallmark Christmas movies, decorated for Christmas, thankful the Pilgrims & Indians became friends & had a celebration.

Thankful for good food &
clean water, favorite Thanksgiving
thing was definitely the sweet potato dessert.

* Fri 26th - Leftover Thanksgiving fixings for lunch & supper, thankful for Christmas music played on the radio while driving to work.

Week 48

* Weekend 27th & 28th - Beautiful weekend for camping & trail riding, leftover Thanksgiving fixings for supper, watched 2 more favorite Christmas movies on dvd - Christmas Lodge & The Holiday, found some caves to explore, thankful for nice weather to enjoy the last weekend of the month.

Original pass before the 
road was built.

Maneuvering though some
of the rocks was a tight squeeze.

 

* Mon 29th - Did inventory at work, thankful all the counts came out good.

*Tues 30th - Mailed the last box of Christmas presents, thankful & blessed that my holiday gift giving is complete.

Moma already opened her Christmas presents,
said she loved the shirt.

These are some of the things that's been going on in my neck of the woods, how about you?

              

Snow & other October Happenings

 Hello there Adventurous Friends, greetings from South Dakota.  How you doing?  October is over & I've not mailed any of my Christmas boxes yet.  I like to beat the Christmas time mailing rush & also be sure all the presents arrive to the Grands in plenty of time.  This is Sentence a Day where I join others & write a little something about each of my days, wrote in a long drawn out sentence or 2.  It seems October flew by for me & this here is how it went. 

* Fri 1st - Had the afternoon off, relaxed, watched Pitching Love & Catching Faith, started watching Maid series.

Week 40

* Weekend 2nd & 3rd -  Kevin got an antelope, going to can it, went camping up in the hills under the pine tree, discovered the camper has a DVD player & the toilet works. 

Looking in the top cabinets in
the camper, they all appeared to be empty.

Looking in the top cabinets in the
camper while standing on a step stool.  SUPRISE!

 

* Mon 4th - No Lions club meeting, decided to eat supper out at the #3, Daughter & Grands back to school & work after their quarantine. 

* Tues 5th - Had the afternoon off, folded laundry & put it away, prepped antelope meat for canning, watched episodes of Maid.

* Wed 6th - Changed the sheets on the bed, exhausting & aggravating day at work, Kevin cooked supper, I washed the dishes, watched the last episodes of Maid.

* Thurs 7th - Got the homemakers friend 2022 planner I ordered, bought groceries, did a little side hustle cleaning job.

* Fri 8th - Planned camping menus & packed the camper, made a curtain for one of the camper windows, friends took us out to supper as payback for giving them stuff out of the garden.

Week 41

Happy Birthday to Grand Colton!

Tried her 1st bites 
of baby food.

            

The curtain worked perfect.

* Weekend 9th, 10th & 11th - Columbus Day/Native American Day holiday, went camping up at the pond, forgot the onion buns & pork & beans, tried out the camper oven & shower, snow clouds rolled in.

Probably the last of the leaf color for the season,
a lot of the leaves were already off the trees.

* Tues 12th - Wore long johns & long sleeves to work, temps in mid 50s, more snow clouds moved in, Kevin got the gas logs heat fired up.

Looking out the window during suppertime,
there is still mators out there.

Came out of work to this.

  

* Wed 13th - The snow had turned to rain, made a crockpot of chili for supper using leftover pinto beans.

I knew I would get stuck but needed to get
 off the road for when the snowplow came
 through, Kevin came to dig me out.

No snow at home, then this driving to work
24 miles away. Jesus took the wheel &
 got me to work & back home safely. 

Snow piles in the back parking area, electricity went out
for about 2 hours or so, did some extra cleaning & preparing
paperwork to be shredded since there was nothing else much to do,
10 to 14 inches of snow accumulations reported.

* Thurs 14th - Had the afternoon off work, caught up on opening the mail, paid bills & balanced the check books, did a couple loads of laundry, watched episodes of Major Dad & Seinfeld. 

* Fri 15th - 2 afternoons off work in a row, put gas in my car & bought groceries, worked on laundry some more, started watching You, another Bates Motel type show, creepy.

Having hotdogs for lunch with leftover homemade
 chili & the giant Hershey bar I won at bingo.

Week 42

* Sat 16th - Bingo night, made a jug of lemonade & a candy tray.

* Sun 17th - Went on a 4wheeler ride & had a picnic then put away things around in the house that had collected here & there that had started looking like a place of hoarding.

* Mon 18th - Lions club meeting, talked about having a potluck instead of a catered Christmas dinner & invite the bingo folks.

* Tues 19th - Washed up the dishes that seemed to be a couple days worth, made apple pie nachos.

Kevin was delighted I made a recipe using some of his
 chunky applesauce from the freezer, he mentioned it was one of
the weirdest best things I had ever made.

* Wed 20th - Planned camping menus, sandwiches, chips & pb crackers; foods that don't require washing dishes since the camper had been winterized.

* Thurs 21st - Got gas & groceries, sorted laundry & did a load, ran out of socks between washings, loaded the camper.

Looking for a little hand held mirror to
use in the camper.  Remember these?

Week 43

* Weekend 22nd, 23rd & 24th -  Camped on the fairgrounds at the gun show, shopped at the dollar store, washed the road grim off my car at the car wash, did some reading & relaxing, picked up trash around the camp area while out walking with Rose.

Enjoyed hanging out with Kevin
at the gun show all weekend.

* Mon 25th - Helped Kevin dig the tators, started wrapping Grand's Christmas gifts.

A tumbleweed blocking the walking trail
out in the trees.

Me washing the tators off with the hose
while Kevin gets them out of the ground.

The littlest Grands trick or treating at
Moma's house & went trunk or treating
with Sister. Sister painted the sign &
made the jack-o-lantern that made an
awesome fall/Halloween scene in their 
yard.

* Tues 26th - Windy, the needing gas light came on in my car, gas $3.94 per gallon, went over $50, gracious.

* Wed 27th - Attended a short work ethics meeting, off work early, cooked salisbury hamburger helper & baked tator for supper, made leftover bowls for work lunches, watched episodes of You & Mr Iglesias, chatted with Daughter.

Jason from Friday the 13th, Little Bo Peep lost 
her sheep & Rapunzel.

Ready for trick-or-treaters.

* Thurs 28th - Wiped in the fridge, emptied & washed containers, bought groceries, costume monster march after school & trick or treating businesses.

* Fri 29th -  Had another work ethics meeting, the new one has lots to learn, tired, went to bed early & fell asleep watching episodes of whatever it was I was watching.

Week 44

* Weekend 30th & 31st - Went camping over in the buttes, good thing we packed our cold weather gear for trail riding, forgot the dish rag & towel, made a pot of chili for Halloween, had 38 trick or treaters.

Christmas cactus blooming.

Getting warmed up with a tasty cup of hot spiced
 cider along one the riding trails.

       

These are some of the things that's been going on in my neck of the woods, how about you?

Precious Grand #8.

Apple fritter bread & other September Happenings

 Hello there Adventurous Friends, greetings from South Dakota.  How you doing? September is National Preparedness Month, so I thought... what would we actually need to be prepared if the electricity went off for several days due to a snow storm or such.  

Last winter there was that unusual unexpected snow storm that hit Texas.  Kevin & I survived the Blizzard of 93 in North Carolina, being out of power for about a full week.  Daughter was about 5 years old back then.  We had a wood heater at that time & used it to cook on as well as for heating the house.  Snow out on the back deck was used to keep things cold for refrigeration.  

Reading the disaster list of supplies, 1st thing on the list, water.  We would need drinking water.  We did have a couple gallons of  drinking water but used it up this summer camping.  While shopping at the grocery store mid month, I got a case of bottled water to have on hand to add back to our food stock.  We'll have the water available to use on picnics next summer then replenish again next fall.  

This is Sentence a Day where I join others & write a little something about each of my days, wrote in a long drawn out sentence or 2.  Last September is when I joined the Sentence A Day bloggers.  WOW!  I've stuck with it & have been participating for a year.  I've looked back from time to time to see when certain things happened.  Kevin was asking when was the week we went camping in the Big Horns last year & I was wondering when we went leaf looking, I was able to look back & remember.  Yay me, the person my family says never remembers anything.  Here is what happened last September, lets see what happened this September.

Happy Birthday to Grand Tripp.

* Wed 1st - Changed the sheets on the bed, worked on laundry & did a few other cleaning duties around in the house.

* Thurs 2nd - Got groceries & gas, made a pumpkin crunch cake.

* Fri 3rd - Gave the dog a bath, watched some tv, there was another season of Manifest.

Week 36

* Sat 4th -  Caught up on stuff around the house after work, did a couple loads of laundry, cleaned here & there.

* Sun 5th -  Went along with a fellow Lions club member as drivers to his grandson's wedding, Kevin drove & I did the mapping that took us off course around the scenic loop.

Good thing we still had 2 1//2 hours to find the place
before the wedding was supposed to start.

* Mon 6th - Wedding anniversary, 36 years of marriage, walked down to see the parade, had the chamber's BBQ for lunch, checked out the car show & voted for my favorites.

* Tues 7th - Back to work after 2 days off, seemed like Monday, brought in the patio table & dumped out a fall scene puzzle to work on since it's getting darker earlier.

* Wed 8th - Made supper before work, mixed up BBQ pork for sandwiches, seemed like Tuesday but was already Wednesday, the week is going by quick.

* Thurs 9th - Got groceries & gas, got a case of bottled water to have on hand to be prepared for the unexpected, gave Rose a bath in Dawn dish liquid to see if that gets the fleas off.

* Fri 10th - The air was smokey & smelled smokey, the worst smokey day yet, watched Mistletoe Promise on the Hallmark channel, gave Rose a treatment of Steelcoat, it's compared to Frontline.

Week 37

* Sat 11th - Did some catching up on laundry & opening the mail, made a tator tot casserole, niece got antibody infusion for Covid.

* Sun 12th - Moma, Sister & Great Nephew have Covid, helped with Lions club Golf & Horseshoe tournament, delicious ham salad sandwiches for lunch, good turnout.

* Mon 13th - Moma went to urgent care & didn't have to be admitted to the hospital, she got scheduled for the antibody infusion, that was good news, back working in town for at least a couple weeks, made a purchase agreement to buy a camper that is a toy hauler.

* Tues 14th - Moma's infusion was postponed, rumor they were out, felt good walking to work for the fresh air & sunshine, helped Kevin cut up & prep 2 turkey breasts to cook in the crockpot.

* Wed 15th - Moma got the antibodies, picked pumpkins, a coworker stopped by, sent squash & melons home with her.

Having good thoughts about making a pie or 2.

* Thurs 16th - Got groceries, talked to Sister, Moma was feeling better.

* Fri 17th - Kevin brought home the camper.

It seems HUGE compared to the truck slide in.
The side by side is too big too fit, what to do?

Week 38

* Sat 18th - Facetimed with Moma, she was very weak & sad, her brother died of Covid, she can't go to the family gatherings, the funeral or prepare any food.

Bingo time!  Have I mentioned that I go for the snacks?

Made apple fritter bread, might have
overfilled the pan a smidge, the side
broke off.

* Sun 19th - Stayed around home catching up on stuff, did a little baking, washed the shower curtain, ordered next year's planner, got Moma set up for a video chat with a cousin so she could virtually attend her brother's funeral.

* Mon 20th - Made blueberry cobbler to take to Lions club meeting, Daughter & Son in Law have Covid

* Tues 21st - Ordered snack "junk" foods from Walmart grocery pickup for the Grands to enjoy during their quarantine, in the mix was apples, strawberries, bananas & clementines. 

* Wed 22nd - Kevin solved our camper dilemma, he traded for a side by side 10 inches smaller.

 Thankful for Daughter's mild symptoms.

A little spooky at the grocery store.

*Thurs 23rd - Got groceries & gas.

Pretty mums at the town office.

* Fri 24th - Went to the electric & telephone company's tailgate customer appreciation cookout at the football game for supper, there was brats, hotdogs & chips; watched the last episode of How to Get away with Murder. 

She'll be wanting her 2 
front teeth for Christmas.

Week 39

* Weekend 25th & 26th - Facetimed with Daughter & the Grands, went camping up at the pond with the new set up, didn't like the windshield on the side by side, it had too much glare, sucked in too much dust & made the inside too hot, Happy Birthday to Sister Sharon.

Camp

Inside the camper is very spacious with lots
of storage spaces.

Rose likes to facetime too.

Entertained a friend of Grand's.

The leaves seemed to be at their
peek fall color.

* Mon 27th - Wishing we were still camping, hoping & dreaming of an early retirement offer soon, got off work a couple hours early, rode along with Kevin on a work call to get an ice cream cone, watched Reluctant Nanny on Hallmark.

* Tues 28th - Went to Dentist appointment, got 2 crowns, seems waking up with clenched teeth is not a good thing, hopeful it is stress related & will cure itself with some simple techniques.

* Wed 29th - Worked on releasing stress, started the day with a good cup of Maxwell House coffee made in the Keurig, walked to work for the fresh air, sunshine & exercise; thanked the good lord for things I was thankful for, good conversation & supper with less talk about aggravating things at work.

* Thurs 30th - High school homecoming next week, brainstormed ideas to decorate office windows with a Game Shows theme, rode up to the dollar store to get totes, hooks & other supplies for the camper, got more Halloween candy thinking about the trick-or-treat parade around town for our office, grabbed chicken & tator wedges for super.

These are some of the things that's been going on in my neck of the woods, how about you?