Ah! Sweet Victory

I only wish I had more of it. But that's beside the point. This is about what I do have!

Did I mention that I finally decided what color to paint my bathroom? You know it took me longer to decide that than it took me to decide whether or not to go to college? Anyway, it's done. Whew! And the paint is on so I can't change my mind. Now for my bedroom . . . .

I am also working on putting the Christmas stuff away. Now, before you laugh, I must tell you that there are reasons that it's February and I still haven't done that. 1) I have a bad memory, I rarely spend much time in the rooms wherein such things were located, and I am often unobservant. Thus, I didn't think of it very often. 2) I wanted to do it right. You know, organized so we can actually find things when we need them. It has never been that way before. There were numerous boxes of miscellaneous stuff and it was hard to find things. I designated this year the year to get everything organized because now that we're in the house I have room and this was the first year we had all of the Christmas stuff together (although I honestly think there is another box hiding somewhere). 3) I need more storage containers so I can get my own stuff organized and I can't afford to buy many, so booting family stuff out of my personally owned plastic storage containers that have been housing Christmas stuff sounded like a great idea.

The good news is, the stuff is getting booted--at least as much as will fit in the large blue plastic tubs Mom and I retrieved out of storage. She emptied them of the old food they contained (think rancid flour and old pasta, not old refrigerator contents). I scrubbed them up. Progress is being made. I may still have to use some of my boxes. At least it will all be organized and away. Some of the stuff belongs to me personally anyway.

There is hope. :-)

The Hungry Beast

Lately my hope chest has been demanding more food (really politely requesting, but it seems like demanding to me). It's hungry, it says. It reminds me of this, smiling innocently while I inwardly cringe. But I do have an obligation--I brought the creature into existence.

And, what does it want? Action. Simple as that. Not so much, it says, the action of putting things into it, but of putting action itself into it. Sigh. How dare it. How dare it remind me of one of my worst faults. How dare it tell me what I need to hear.

I am really not a very active person. Well, to be honest (I think it would appreciate that too), I am simply not an active person. That is just the way I am: putting things off--sometimes for an understandable reason, sometimes out of mere habitual laziness--indecision, shrinking back in fear, avoiding everything, moving as little as possible.

The way I am is going to have to change. Not all at once with a big bang. That would be impossible. But the hungry beast must be fed, right? I've got to get moving, make some decisions, stop avoiding work, stop putting things off--if it kills me (and really, putting away the nail clippers that have been lying about for weeks on end mere inches from their home in a drawer, putting away the remainder of my Christmas gifts and carting the box they were in out of my bedroom, clearing the odd bits of thread and fabric from a recent sewing project off my sewing table, and all the other little treats I gave the beast this afternoon were really quite painless).

Wish me well. I'm off to do something. Decide something. Anything (though I'm sure my hope chest does have some very specific tastes--I'll let you know if I find out what they are).

--Your rebuked and slightly worried Hopeful.

What?

Where have I been?

I think my absence initially had something to do with me working in the Christmas trees (tying on tags). But since I only did that for about a week, that doesn't quite explain it all does it? Hehe So much for being consistent. I really need to work on that.

I would like to say that I have been really, really busy but that isn't true. What I've been is depressed and I think that's my best excuse! I am chronically depressed anyway but lately I've had a particularly bad spell of it. I think I'm among the living now. :-)

And now I am busy! Getting ready for company this weekend, Thanksgiving Dinner on Sunday (no, we're not confused), and a tree-trimming party Saturday night. Making and buying Christmas gifts with very little money, too! Practicing songs to sing for church this Sabbath and next. Or at least I have been practicing this week's ("O Holy Night"). I haven't even found the music to next week's ("Mary, Did You Know?"), and I am supposed to play and sing both. Eek! It's around here somewhere. I sang it last year.

I'm seriously contemplating something interesting to post in the near future. You never know, it might happen!

Fear of the Needle . . . and Thread

Sewing is supposed to be fun. It scares me. When I think about it I start breathing hard. Whenever I see a needle I nearly faint. I have nightmares about encounters with my sewing machine.

Okay, it really doesn't scare me quite that badly. I admit I made the last three sentences up. But I do fear it. I can just never seem to quite conquer it.

I have no clue why except that:

I'm a fearful person.
I fear failure
I fear frustration
I fear difficult learning tasks

And I'm a perfectionist.
It has to be perfect
The first time
And if it can't be perfect then I'm not even going to try

I have to laugh at myself, because, of course, that is a perfect explanation of my problem. I have no need to continue wondering why I fear sewing. Now, what to do about it.

I am not very good at it yet--not much practice--so therein lies the frustration. Lots of new things to try to comprehend. I also lack supplies and the money to buy them.

I have this fabric but no thread to match it, that idea but no pattern, another project I can do without a pattern and with the thread and fabric I have, but I need another kind of needle. (Okay, I do have some money but I fear I will buy the wrong thing or won't be able to finish a project once I have bought the stuff and will thus waste money.) Such a dreadful state of affairs, and I'm sure my entire problem is just a lack of money.

Yeah right. When I took sewing in college ( I got an A or A-, which is clear evidence that I don't have a clue what I'm doing, right?), a lady who could already sew took the class just for easy credit. She was past "college-age" and had been sewing for many years. She showed us some pictures of things she had made. She told us about her first sewing project too, when she was a little girl: she made a skirt out of an old umbrella!

I guess what I really need is some creativity and a good sense of adventure. I had some creativity around here somewhere, but I have looked under every book, between all papers, in every box, and under every piece of furniture, and I have not found one sense of adventure, good or otherwise. What shall I do? I don't have any old umbrellas from which to make skirts!

I guess what I need to do is get the right kind of needle to finish my terry-cloth apron I am making out of an old towel. Except that I don't know what kind of needle to get. I'll have to research that. Thoroughly. Next week. And then compare prices to make sure I'm getting the best deal. And then reevaluate to make sure that is really the project I want to finish next. And then double-check to make sure my research findings were accurate.

See? I face my fears squarely, don't I?

The Big Change

Well, it has officially happened. The big event each Fall that marks the end of Summer and the beginning of Winter: the First Frost. Eric (brother) and I gathered the last of the peppers and tomatoes the other night--after dark, in thirty-something weather (and he didn't even wear a jacket!). It is unusual that the frost should come so late--nearly November. It was late last year too, but can come in early September. I like it better when it is late!

The garden is gone. Of course, there are still greens and bok choy, but the "Summer garden" is past for another seven months. Only the freezing of greens and bok choy, the drying of apples, and the making of applesauce remain.

Those who do not grow gardens may notice the changing of the seasons, yet the change has little effect on their daily lives. Although I am not so bound up in agriculture as some (such as those who actually farm!) the first frost both really and symbolically is the turning point between the season of planting and growing and harvesting, and the season of resting and waiting and planning. It's like the new year, or a new semester of college--a time to look back at the accomplishments and failures of the past few months, a time to make necessary changes for the future, a time to plan, a time to move forward with the things that past months could not afford but the months ahead crave.

What will I do? I don't know. I haven't gotten that far yet. :-)

Letting someone else speak for a change

And I quote:

Interior Decoration, as I intimated before, is not just one's artistic efforts, but is that which your home (even if it is just a room) is. If you are 'decorating' with clothes draped on every chair, with scratched or broken furniture--it is still your interior decoration! Your home expresses you to other people, and they cannot see or feel your daydreams of what you expect to make in that misty future, when all the circumstances are what you think they must be before you will find it worthwhile to start. You have started, whether you recognize that fact or not.

--Edith Schaeffer, The Hidden Art of Homemaking

Knowledge: A Little Reality Check Therein

If you were to take a test covering the following somewhat randomly selected homemaking-related areas, at an elementary, high school, or college level, would you pass?

Home management
Money management
Resource management
Time management
Organization/space management
Shopping
Housing
Home safety
Food preservation
Foods and nutrition
Cooking/baking
Gardening/lawn care, etc.
Housekeeping/cleaning
Mending/clothing repair
Ironing
Clothing selection and care
Laundering
Knitting/other needle crafts
Sewing
Art in life
Etiquette /manners
Hospitality and entertaining
Family relations
Parenting
Marriage
Courtship/dating
Communication
Child development
Human development
Health

The Woman I Need to Be for God

In my second post, in the explanation of the hope chest category of "Womanhood," I mentioned that, among other things, we need to focus on being the woman we need to be for God. Sometime after I wrote that, it occurred to me that I had never done that. *blush*

Now, of course, I had sought the will and ways of God, and sought His will for my life, and tried to do His will (not without success). Of course I had tried to be a good, virtuous woman, and had been daily learning and growing . . . . Of course I had asked Him what He wanted me to do and how to do it, and, well, all sorts of things. But, in complete ignorance of this unfortunate situation, I had never actually sat down in solitude, and contemplated and enquired of Him just who and what I needed to be, as a woman, for Him. How, um, embarrassing. Like, um, I might have greater success at being the woman He wants me to be if I actually asked Him what that was? Ya think?

I began shortly thereafter to rectify the situation and--call me optimistic, but-- I fully expect my success rate to increase in the near future. ;-)

A day of experiences

Today was a rather lazy day, as Sundays usually are. I have to recover from Sabbath. Now, having to recover from a day of rest seems odd, but that is the way it is with me. My brain and body are used to resting and not having a care in the world on Sabbath, and then come Sunday, they are still in the same mode and resistant to "six days shalt thou labor."

Nonetheless, it was not a day lost. I was dutiful today and vacuumed upstairs and swept the stairs. I know that doesn't sound like much, but for me to do anything when I am supposed to do it, without putting it off for even a day, and without any resistance, is amazing! I'm so proud of myself! That little duty did get put off for a few hours, but only because I went out to the back garden to help with the more urgent task of picking beans.

I also "experienced" making applesauce again. I'm getting the hang of it, I think. I honestly think I could do the whole process by myself (on a smaller scale) up to the point of actually canning the stuff. Canning is one of those things I flee from. It's too complicated for my poor little brain! I don't know if I'll ever really conquer it, but I fear I shall need to get initiated soon. I think I'd prefer to start with waterbath canning rather than pressure canning (and applesauce is canned under pressure). Tomatoes, maybe? Sounds good, since that would mean another year before I have to do it! But the cutting and cooking of the apples, and the making of the applesauce--I think I might have conquered it. If I haven't yet, I will have by the end of this year's making of applesauce. I'll be experiencing it all week and possibly into the next.

Love in Deed (part 2)

It's all very fine and good to plan to "love in deed" in the future, but I have a family to love now. Somehow that isn't nearly as romantic!

I have, however, been contemplating what I can do for each member of my family.


The father
Keep the table cleaned off. We hardly ever eat at it, but he's always had this thing about wanting tables cleaned off. I don't know why tables are any more important that other surfaces, but they seem to be!

Make more meals "put together" rather than just fend-for-yourself leftover operations.

Watch my tone of voice when I speak to him. He simply does not "get" the whole concept of the role of tone of voice in communication, nor any other type of nonverbal communication. When he is doing the speaking, tone of voice is immaterial and when anyone derives meaning from his tone of voice, well, it's clearly all in their head. However, he seems to notice other people's tone of voice and to derive meaning from that, and to be particularly sensitive to my tone of voice, and in such cases it is most certainly not all in his head. Sigh. But, despite this egregious flaw of his, I really ought to be more careful so that I don't annoy him or send him messages I didn't mean to send. This one's going to be hard because when he is in a lot of pain from his injuries, he is hyper-sensitive. LOL Pray for me, please. I am not particularly good with oral communication anyway and "tone of voice" is one of my problems.


The mother
Organize her and Dad's laundry when I put it in their basket rather than just stacking it in any ol' way, so that it will be easier for her to put away.

Learn how to cook rice in our rice cooker so that she doesn't always have to be the one to do it (rice is a constant at our house).

Stop forgetting to "show up" for such dreary tasks as looking blueberries and shelling beans. The poor woman gets stuck with those jobs for hours, and I really don't mean any harm. I just don't think to do them.


The brother
Organize his laundry in his basket.

Always make sure he has food to eat. He has a lot of allergies and can't always eat what the rest of us eat. He hasn't starved yet, but sometimes the food gets scarce!

Help him pick potato bugs. Maybe? Waaaaahhhh! Well, I'm sure he'd appreciate it. Or help with some other such gardening task he seems to have a greater commitment to than anyone else does.