Closing Thoughts for Year 2015

 New Year's Day Sweetness

Last night, on New Year's Eve, J. picked me up for one last local brewery visit. I returned home in time for church services at 7 PM.

Beer and church. This is my life!

At 8:30 PM we left for our party at A & O's. I stayed up late to watch the ball drop again on Fox News, after I got home from the party, where I watched the ball drop on a channel with people I don't know or like. I was able to sleep very late.

When I was a youth I did not stay up late, but we always had to get up early the next morning for a New Year's Day service, because that is what we did. We spent most of Christmas week in church it seemed. The New Year's Day service has now been eliminated (and most evening services), thankfully.

I woke up bloated from too much holiday food of the wrong kind. Methinks the meatball app did me in. But for the last clean out the bad food, end of the holiday sweetness I made a big pancake for each of us for lunch today, topped with maple syrup and sugar, along with some fried, battered prunes on the side. Prunes aren't just for people who are old and irregular anymore. Didn't you know they are Amazun? A small glass of Tropicana was a sweet treat we don't usually allow ourselves--a little sugar binge before the January diet starts. Also, In my purse I found the Dutch chocolate letter R which O. had gifted to me. Might as well. More sugar.

 Later in the afternoon I made a spinach salad and I could not find the small cup of sweet fruit I had purchased to add to the salad, along with cheese and pecans and grapes and citrus dressing--with more sugar. I finally looked in the Avalon to see if the cup of mandarin oranges had fallen out of my grocery bag. It had not--it was found later in the meat drawer.

But what did I find under the passenger's seat of hubby's car?

The sweetest thing of all!

My Subaru key--lost last summer--the key that set off the security alarm and made my car horn honk endlessly. I tore up the house looking for that key! It was in close proximity to my car the whole time, probably still causing the occasional trouble I had. I can't wait to see if it now works properly when I get the car back from the shop on Monday. It has had many months to thoroughly dry out from its washing machine adventure in a pants pocket. Attached to the FOB was the free snack size Frosty card (pictured previously on the blog in a rice bag), which just expired at the end of 2015.

A new glitch is that the car is in the shop which has been closed since Thursday, when I found out that the timing belt they were going to replace had already been replaced by the previous owner in 2014! I have to get up at 7 AM Monday to call. I hope, hope, hope they have not done the work yet--it would save us a chunk of change! Maybe we can buy that deck furniture after all!

Dinner tonight was tiny new potatoes--one sweet, smoked pork chops, snow peas and sweet corn, which we almost never eat.  Later I finished off the pretzel crackers from New Year's Eve with the sweet orange-fig jam and the delicious gouda-parm combo that I discovered recently. And the last local craft beer of the year, shared with the husband. It was very good. I would buy it again (pricey, tho).

Black Goat - double black lager from Perrin Brewing Co.

I noticed on Instagram that a lomo al trapo (salt-encrusted beef tenderloin, wrapped in a cloth and cooked in a fire or over coals) was featured for New Year's Day dinner in Florida. Yum.That would have been better than anything we ate here. Lomo and a salad would have been a nice treat for the day, skipping the usual accompaniment of a loaf of crusty bread.

I hope in the future we can make holidays less about food--and certainly not about all the sweet, salty and fatty indulgences that have become the expected fare.

But what else do you suggest? Where shall I start?

More church?? Less Beer??
_______________________________________________

NEW BLOG LINK for 2016:

yetanotheryearofliving.blogspot.com

Final DiscoveryTour posts for 2015

The Discovery Tour, My Beer Journey, My Year of Beer, is over. Two more new Michigan craft breweries were visited just before the close of 2015. The link to the final fall months:

http://onemoreyearofliving.blogspot.com/2015/10/discovery-tour-2015-final-months.html

Penultimate Post/Penultimate Michigan Craft Brewery Visit

The tree was decked out in red again this year--at the insistence of the husband, but I bought a few clearance ornaments for another time.

Christmas is over and I am a bit bored already (watching TV/movies and a little cleaning/sorting). Although the weather is finally wintry/dark and although there was little Christmas cheer to save this year, I am not too depressed yet. However, I did get awakened from a deep sleep/dream with some bad news early this morning.

The Subaru Forester apparently has a few leaks--and well, as long as they are in there--might as well replace that timing chain now. It is 14 thousand miles over the recommendation on that and I don't think it has been replaced...

The steering wheel fluid pump they replaced in July has a little leak, too, and that will be replaced for free. Woop woop.

Spending money on an older car is always a bit of a kicker. I told the husband (who was not happy) to forget about the clearance deck furniture and just pay the repairs. I'll haul out an old table next summer if we need one (we have several nice wooden tables in the basement) and buy a few more stackable plastic chairs and/or spray paint a couple of the old Adirondack style chairs...

But--I have no car until Monday, when the steering fluid reservoir part comes in. Tomorrow I need to grocery shop and I will need to use the husband's precious Avalon, which I rarely drive. The street snow has melted and I should be able to safely navigate to D & W and back! The sales at the mall will still be there next week, if I have any money left. I am really not much of a mall shopper, but it would give me something to do...

Choir rehearsal was cancelled today and I really have no where to go until the New Year's Eve church service, and then, the usual party with old friends. I need to make an appetizer. I wish I could just download an app...

There are too many delicious choices for end of the year parties and I have seen them all on Facebook and Instagram posts. Last year I bought a dozen olliebollen at the new Propaganda Doughnuts shop downtown and I think I did something with bacon. It's national bacon day today (not international--that's another day). Two days for bacon! But I'm kinda over bacon right now...

After the news tonight, the husband took me (seems I am the only one with nothing to do/friends who are busy) to the second-to-the-last (penultimate) brewery on the list for the year. We sampled a cute flight of 5 and even enjoyed a few, particularly the Russian stout. I bought a couple bottles of wine as well, including a jalapeno wine--how crazy is that!

One more day to go this year ... and one last brewery to visit...

But lots of things to contemplate in/for the new year...

Will the blog continue? (The beer blog portion will come to an end, but will there be a new theme/project?)

What words/expressions will I attempt to ban from my life this year? (The husband is delighted that problematic made one of the lists this year as a word that should be banned!)

Full retirement for the one of us that has still been working full time will occur mid-summer at a time when (he) will be focused on the links/greens and might not notice the difference for a few weeks!

Will we throw a big retirement party?

Will we finally achieve some of that elusive weight loss?

Will our good health continue?

Will we see any more friends/relatives escorted into eternity? I think of in-law Aunt/second cousin V. and in-law Aunt Hazel V. and mother-in-law Grandma Rose who have passed on this year. I have no one left of the older generation on my side of the family. I have lost a number of first cousins as well. The husband has only one uncle and two aunt-in-laws left...

With the passing of the husband's mother we are now both officially in the older generation, but it is not at all clear that we are now wiser...

As predicted, I am ending this year with dots and trailing thoughts...

So, in all its multiple grammatical usages (I have just decided!) will be banned next year! (I already edited/removed four so's from this post...

Maybe a few less exclamation points...

Sooooo .... see you  next year!!!!

Not So Much Christmas Cheer Here this Year!

How was your Christmas? Was it Merry?

This year on Christmas morning I woke up to darkness and traveled to church on deserted streets to rehearse in the church choir that I have been a part of since September. We sang a lot of new and old carols in church, and as is the tradition, concluded with the Hallelujah Chorus, for which half the church joins the choir. It was finally nice to be out of the advent season and actually be able to celebrate the birth of Christ in full glory--no subdued songs or dull wardrobe choices--and no more candlelight until New Year's Eve. The title of the brief sermon was "Good Glory."

I'm not good at mornings, so this was a bit of a gift--not that I am so gifted, with my modest vocal talents--but to arise early to participate in something that is greater than anything I could do as a single vocalist required more effort than I am inclined to expend. I wore my old Christmas sweater (not too ugly) with that line on the front "Yuletide carols being sung bya choir."

The rest of the day was like a lazy Sunday, including a nap on the couch under my heated throw. It was bright and sunny out, but I resisted the impulse to pick up branches in the yard that had fallen with that recent violent wind storm. Thousands are without power in the area!

I did make the traditional chicken and broccoli casserole for the two of us. I didn't add a lot of buttery and crusty bread to the top and totally forgot to pick up a lemon for that squeeze of lemon juice, but it was still completely delicious. I steamed the fresh broccoli in generous chunks and then immediately assembled the casserole and popped it in the oven, so the broccoli was still green and sweet and maintained a bit of integrity. The other key to success was using a freshly cooked (last batch on Christmas Eve) Amish deli chicken with herb seasoning--so the chicken was already tasty without the sauce--and then, I topped it off with a generous amount of freshly grated cheddar cheese.

The husband gave the curried chicken divan casserole a rating of 8.7 out of 10 which is pretty high for a meal that does not contain mashed potatoes!

I thought of our girls--they all love this casserole. M. made it for Christmas Eve--even though I think it got to a crazy mid-seventies that day in NYC--before taking the train to Connecticut on Christmas morning. R. enjoyed paella and later crab legs on the grill for their very warm Christmas in Florida, heading to Palm Coast later on Christmas Day with her Bogota guests. E. hopefully enjoyed some good treats on her working holiday at the hospital, since everybody brings food to share.

On Christmas evening we watched a ridiculous spy movie on HBO On Demand and then I finished out the evening alone with a chick flick from 2006, The Holiday, with Jack Black, Jude Law, Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet. This romantic film ended happily with everyone finding love by New Year's Eve.

This was a Christmas with no relatives, not even an evening of tree trimming with my Aunt V., who passed on to glory last February. No Christmas party in Chicago either, since we had all just been together to celebrate the home-going of the husband's mother, who passed on the eve of her 97th birthday.

And no Christmas Day "cheer," or even a beer--not a drop!

We played with our toys, though. We assembled our new fitbits and tried to figure out how to plug the wireless earphones into the television. I nibbled on my beer peanut brittle (I think the alcohol cooks out) which was delicious--except that the peanuts were not of optimum freshness.

Yes, I did well with gifts that matched my interests. I was gifted with beautiful black ceramic pots, for flowers next year on the new deck. And I got "The Complete Beer Course" book (boot camp for beer geeks) as well as beer soap!

Earlier in the week we assembled a new deck box which is big enough to use as my coffin (big deck=big deck box!) I won $20 from the husband for figuring out where  two holes were located, as described in the assembly instructions.

As I will soon close out my year of beer with one last brewery in town and one more entry in the sub-blog of beer, maybe I can learn more about all the crazy stuff we sampled this year! The book is easy on the eyes and written in an accessible and humorous style. I would have been able to describe our flights with much better beer jargon if I had browsed a book like this before starting on the year-long adventure!

So much to learn--in beer and life!!

 I consumed at least one gose beer this year (pronounced "goes-uh" I learned) which apparently has a long history in the sour and salty.

I was also reading about the real trappist monk beer that is mostly brewed in Belgium. At one point the author uses the words "a trap beer" which is just fun. There is only one abbey in the Netherlands on the list of eleven authentic monk-supervised abbeys which brew beer. It has a restaurant and shop and apparently some brewery tours are available. It has been put (mentally and now here) on my bucket list for retirement!

Christmas Cheer to all!

Trash Removal Taken to a New Level

Removal is $100, but this is a great system!

And we have lift-off!

The cleanup continues around here. The balmy December weather has allowed me to shop vac my car in the driveway and even wax and detail it a little.

Last year on this date I mulched the lawn one last time and the husband golfed. It is not the first, nor will it be the last warm December in Michigan.

Today it is 58 degrees, 99% chance of rain and 97% humidity at 3:00 PM, so no golf or mowing! Instead the husband did lunch with the guys and I finished my last minute Christmas shopping.

(Tonight is our gift opening--connecting through Google Hangout to three states.)

So anyway, yesterday the great green BAGSTER was finally removed from the driveway, along with all the remaining piano parts from the Great Piano Sledgehammer-Fest.

I had never seen this process before. I tossed on a few more pieces after I asked the trash man if it would be too much. He told me to throw it on--and unless I had a car in there or something, it would not be too heavy.

I took about 10 photos. I thought the husband might enjoy them. He worked on such trucks when he was a young strapping youth. This trash man only pushed buttons on a device hung around his neck, maneuvering the crane arm thing into position remotely--no heavy lifting required!

Some of the boards pictured below were scavenged while the bag sat there for weeks on end, and then we added more new deck leftovers--and then those piano parts. So glad it is finally up, up and away!

Some of these boards were removed via Craig's List.

Saturday Afternoon Comfort Food

Mm Mm Good

We were the recipients of a tiny tease of snow yesterday, which is already fast disappearing from the earth, still warm from an unseasonably warm December. Our new deck remains white, but we are promised warming weather through Christmas, so that will also soon be gone.

The sun room, even with the added warmth of a lighted tree, seemed cold today. So the husband started the gas fireplace--and hot soup for lunch sounded great. We shared a can of Campbell's Tomato Bisque, adding my whole (sweet) Lactaid Milk, a sprinkling of celery salt and a tiny pat of butter. The grilled cheese on the side was white Italian bread with Kraft Deluxe cheese singles, fried in Land O'Lakes butter--almost as good as my Mom made, although it's really hard to remember .... probably home-canned "organic" tomatoes with "top milk" (cream floated to the top of our un-homogenized milk jars). I know that my mother used celery salt and I seem to remember that she may have added that pat of butter (not home-churned, but fresh from our Land O'Lakes plant in town.)

I had just looked at a Food and Wine Instagram post from an Amsterdam food blogger--of a hamburger on a bed of wasabi arugula dressed with a vinaigrette, plus chili Gouda, chimichurri, a fried egg with golden yolk dripping down the side, topped with  homemade panko-and-cornmeal-crisped onion rings. Insane!

My simple bowl of soup was good enough for me today, with those yummy buttered grilled cheese points dipped in--and it reminded me of Mom's tomato soup. It would not have been sufficient for a Big Farm lunch (dinner) but would certainly have been adequate for a Sunday supper! And it potentially was accompanied by one or two of her famous homemade "buns" which could have contained a slice of Land O'Lakes American cheese and some butter!

My photo was not Instagram-worthy. I snapped just one shot and didn't notice that my spoon had covered  the grilled cheese. But the soup was certainly Saturday-afternoon-tummy-worthy!

A Clean Roof for Santa!

The only Santa in the house--a wine bottle cover from a Book Club white elephant gift exchange.

I may not have made Christmas cookies by the time Santa is expected, but Up on the Housetop he will find a roof blown clean. The reindeer should be able to make a clear landing on the flat roof above the sun room. I will Let it Shine for Santa through the freshly cleaned skylights.

I don't usually delay this long--and sometimes by now It is Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas--but this year my procrastinations have once again put me in a good place: now every single leaf  has dropped and my Clean Sweep should last the winter.

So yes, yesterday afternoon, once again the husband held Jacob's Ladder as I ascended, and then handed me the blower and threw up a rag and and an extra bag (baaa--three bags full). He was ready to rise to throw open the slider at the first sound of clatter--to hear if I had fallen off the roof!

The new shingles and my new Nike sandals secured my Safe Passage, even though it started to rain while I was up there and things got a little slippery on the rubbery flat roof.

The wet leaves made such a mess Blowin' in the Wind that I had to blow and then hose things off when I came down from the roof above to the earth below. Since I have also neglected to take my hoses in, they were at the ready. I sprayed down the whole big deck and also the front porch and the freshly whitewashed garage door.

I hope Santa appreciates my efforts for a clean roof and house and doesn't Passover our house. But if he does, Great is the Faithfulness of Amazon Prime, and packages are flying through the air even as we speak.

Time to Plant Tulips?

At the end of October I cleared up a spot of myrtle in the church garden that I thought would be perfect for a few tulips.

My procrastinating did not mean forgetting. The weather has been rainy, way above freezing and not too late to plant some spring bulbs! So yesterday I stopped at a Flowerland and found just a few tulips left that nobody else wanted! They are called Rococo and are pretty funky looking. They were also quite a bargain at a 75% discount.

 I planted 21 tulips that were encased in "bloom pads," a new concept for me and really easy: one trowel, a few shakes of Osmocote and 3 packs of 7 dumped into the hole. I didn't have to space the tulips or even get my hands dirty.

Not snow!--packaging from the "bloom pads" 

They were grown in Holland (where else) and it said on the package they could be planted until December, so I think I'm good. If they attract some attention next spring with their odd color and 20-inch height--even negative attention--that will also be good!

A Bag Lady No More

Last view, last day--lots of chips!

The yard waste facility (affectionately known as THE DUMP) is now closed for the year and there will be no more street pickup until April.

AAAHHH. I can stop cleaning up in my tree-filled yard.

Snow flakes will be flying by week's end, according to the weatherman. And really, this El Nino December weather is ridiculous. Golf and Gardening should end in December in West Michigan! Yesterday it was in the low 60's all through West Michigan--with a high of 63 near the Big Lake.

All the big old yews that were removed for the new deck installation are now also happily in compost-land. With the help of O. and her big vehicle we finished that pile Friday. Saturday I took my last load of leaves, shortly before the facility closed for the season. I cruised right in because Security was in that portable john shown above!

But--I am ready for spring with over a dozen city bags at $2.50 each that others left at the dump. They are folded in a pile and will save me a trip or two in April, when garden cleanup starts again.

After that major effort (the yew pile) the reward had to be greater than a burger, so O. and I tried out a new Smokehouse in town and enjoyed some brisket and pork butt! And bacon brussel sprouts that were very burpy for some reason. Kansas and Texas and fry-style sauces added to these flavorful meats. They have local brews on tap here, too, but we will have to try them another day!

Games People Play

The husband comes from a family of game-lovers. Not just board games but a cork game, mini shuffle board and even a game that requires only paper, pencil and a dictionary. They had a large family and a mother who loved games.

Christmas time at my house was a time to get out the carrom board. I would play with my brother who could not always easily distinguish the red carroms from the green, as I recall. We would shoot with our fingers or a carom stick. We also had checkers, including a metal version of Chinese checkers that we played with marbles, but I don't remember many other games.

Monopoly and Chutes and Ladders were around by the mid-century, but I don't recall them at my country farmhouse.

The Christmas season at our house with our three girls was also associated with games, including "playtime" with their Dad that was accompanied by Mickey Mouse and Sesame Street Christmas music. Later we started acquiring all the usual board games. As they grew older, every year we purchased at least one new game at Christmas time--Wits and Wagers, Cranium, Bible Trivia, Scattegories, Outburst, Deluxe Scrabble, etc.

This game has a $3.00 sticker on it and has never been played here.

This year we will have no children here (or any of THE KIDS) home for Christmas. We will exchange gifts and skype it or phone it in or hang out on Google, but we will not likely play games with just the two of us. We have our smart phones and our computers and our big televison (and even some real books) which provide ample entertainment--but we might have to be a bit inventive to keep up the holiday spirit around here.

In my last post about what was new on our Thanksgiving trip I forgot to include that we played games! We played mostly poker and a little euchre and one game of dominoes. Everyone had to bring a poker game to the table (research the rules and be prepared to explain it). G remembered a poker game from his early years called elevator. I am not very good or lucky at cards and played rather dismally. Fortunately, all that was at stake in the end, was my pride.

But the night we returned from the coast we got out Ticket to Ride - Europe and I redeemed myself! I actually finished all my train routes and got the most points. I could barely locate the cities with European spellings on the map, but it was my time to be lucky for a change.

Another game we play in Florida is Agricola, a game which requires you to build a farm from scratch, decide to select a wife or not and whether to go vegetarian or raise animals for food. It occurs to me that it was not allowed to acquire children without a wife--so a little old-fashioned, as well as primitive--when times get tough you might be faced with feeding your children or cooking a cow in your hearth (if you have one--cow or hearth)!

With no grandchildren on the horizon, it is probably time to stop buying games at Christmas. I still kinda want a deluxe unopened Boggle game (on Ebay?) hint, hint, which is no longer available in the stores.

Words With Friends (or often, Words with Strangers) that I play is enough game for me, I suppose. That and an occasional game of Bubble Safari!

 Do you have a go-to game? Do you play with strangers? Are board game sales declining with all the other available options today? Do you still play Free Cell? Do you remember Pong?

What other games were played back in the mid-century, anyway? I think I may have suffered some deprivation in this area in my childhood...

A Waterfront Thanksgiving

Patio view during  late-afternoon Thanksgiving feast

Our second annual Thanksgiving week in Palm Coast with our two Florida daughters, one son-in-law and the new grand dog, Toffee was much like the first: beautiful condo, delicious food, golf, a tiny dip--mostly in the hot pool--and an excursion to Burrito 101. I'll skip the turkey feast food photos this year. It was more buttery and bacon-y-good than well-photographed.

So just a few notes to highlight what was different this year.

This year we spent five nights at the condo at Hammock Beach.

This year there was no early morning turkey trot, thankfully. I developed painful shin splints last year.

This year the turkey was brined with a prepared mix and added apple cider, with slightly different aromatics inside. It was given an under the breast-skin rub of butter and tented with foil. It was a little less than done in this oven for some reason but was tender and flavorful--the best turkey breast I have had in many years!  G. (who is a leg man) consumed most of the dark meat, and I will have to assume that was also good.

Dessert was homemade pumpkin ice cream with ginger snaps that was indeed *amazing.

New this year was the women joining the men on one of the elite resort courses for a best ball scramble against the husband--which we lost! I stayed back to lounge in the sun on our patio and to keep company with the boat-bound dog, Toffee, on the second day of golf scrambling--which the husband also won handily. A funny video was put up by R. on Facebook and that should be enough about the golf. But let me just say that it was a gorgeous golf course, supposedly designed by Tom Watson--with some killer bunkers! And it was  warm and breezy, a partly overcast day requiring no sunscreen. The only thing that sucked was the playing of the game by the three of us who don't play weekly. I became an expert at filling my fairway gouges with the sand provided in jars on the cart.

The ball in the bunker that was in the video!

The highlight of the trip (besides the Thanksgiving feast) was our first boat ride on the Providencia. Would the winds calm down enough for us to be able to take her out? It had been either too windy or the boat had been under repair on previous visits, so yes, this was a maiden voyage for three of us, although old hat for the other three, including the Toffee dog, who seemed to take the trip down the intercoastal in stride. The only thing that excites Toffee is chasing tennis balls at the beach.

The only eating out at a new place was on Flagler beach on the way home to the Orlando area. We had delicious shrimp, burgers, fries and a pitcher of amber bock at the outdoor picnic tables at High Tides at Snack Jack, a place that caters to dogs. Toffee was given a bowl of water.

Yes, we went back to Burrito 101 this year but new this year was this *amazing Spanish dish which translates "soupy rice," consumed by the son-in-law. The restaurant is run by a Colombian family.

And yes, the dog came along to this restaurant as well, joining us at the outdoor seating. Interestingly, everywhere the dog goes, he is arm candy. It is like taking a walk with a super model according to his parents! The husband tried it--and he didn't get far at all before he was in several conversations with others enjoying the nice weather outdoors at the European Village, as (mostly women) oohed and aahed over Toffee.

But--we indulged ourselves in Winter Park a couple of times--at The Coop and at Shake Shack (new to the husband), as well as taking a boat tour out of Winter Park that highlighted the very expensive new and historic mansions in the chain of lakes around the city--from rich former lumber men to athletes like Horace Grant, who lived there for awhile (played for the Magic) with all things sized to his nearly 7-foot height.

All in all, a great week! We hope to spend more time in Florida in the future ... as full retirement plans develop!

*amazing used with apology. (Trump surely seems to have had success with the word!)

Back to the Comforts (and Clouds) of Home

We arrived home from a week in Florida late Monday evening and now it is suddenly December. With the dregs of the turkey leftovers taken to work by R. for a last lunch for one just before we left for the Orlando airport, Thanksgiving was officially over. We came home from the airport by taxi just before midnight and noticed all the Christmas lights brightening the neighborhood.

On the way back from a 5-night stay in Palm Coast, we ordered an unpeeled shrimp appetizer to eat outdoors in the cool ocean breezes off Flagler Beach. Later that evening we enjoyed a dinner of scallops and kale soup, the fish being a welcome change from the rich and buttery turkey and trimmings leftovers, even though they held up way better than I had anticipated. Even the totally amazing pail of homemade pumpkin ice cream with gingersnap pieces made it back okay to R's Maitland freezer successfully, so we still had a bowl of that after all that fish and kale.

Although to be perfectly honest, I had half a burger and amber bock at the beachfront restaurant after the shrimp, and insisted on going to the Shake Shack of Winter Park for lunch Monday--so I was hardly finished with holiday indulgences.

But for my first dinner home, I craved some simple tomato bisque soup, eaten with a smooth and quiet plastic spoon (partly for the benefit of the newly diagnosed misophonia sufferer) while watching Life Below Zero from our DVR queue.

After all the incredible in-and-out weather temperatures--with ocean breezes flowing through the open screen-less doors of our 5th floor condo, and after enjoying so much delicious holiday food, I was content to coddle my bare feet under a heated throw while I sipped hot tomato soup!

It has been said that home is where the heart is. I think home is where your stuff is--the rumpled sofa, the refrigerator stocked with recognizable brands of favorite foods, the cable programs found easily on your own familiar channels.

I am a bit of a news junkie, and, having suffered some vacation deprivation, I actually watched a news program for an hour on the plane from Orlando to Atlanta. The husband seemed to be having trouble exiting out of the Spanish language on his screen and was soon found taking a nap. He is able to sleep anywhere, it seems, even in the airport! But it is also good to once again enjoy the comforts of the home bed.

The Husband--taking up three seats!

Anyway, as nice as Florida weather is, as long as we have stuff in Michigan, that is where I want to return to. If we downsize to an RV one day (don't laugh), then home might be anywhere...

Which reminds me, I still have a yard here, with no snow. The temps are a chilly low 40's (80 exactly when we left Florida--we were steamin' as we donned our Michigan clothes), but it is nice enough outside to rake or blow a few more leaves that have fallen since we left town! Gotta go.

Winter Storm

Knockout Rose at Uncle J's

We were warned. A winter storm. Saturday morning we awoke to the first snowfall in West Michigan. It was not a storm--just a light dusting of white on the grass. The roads were wet and clear.

I had bagged my last pile of leaves and sticks after dark the night before (with my golf hat head lights on), a crazy woman.

The snow continued to gently fall and the roads remained clear. I asked O if she wanted to ride along with me to dump my leaves. We managed to snag $60 worth of city bags while we there. Then a stop at the Dutch store, and a burger and beer to treat ourselves after our dirty, hard work.

Is this the end or will we have a warm December?

Last year I mulched the lawn the day before Christmas!

I think I am ready for winter this year. It will all still be there waiting come Spring!

My sentences get shorter even as the daylight lessens...

(By the new year I am usually out of thoughts ...  I am left with fragmented bits of nonsense.)

But today the world was white and everything was beautiful. Even untrimmed and neglected shrubs hung with graceful elegance. All the bare patches and darkness of the earth were transformed.

(I am reminded that all the darkness in me shall also, one day, be whiter than snow!)

I returned the sledgehammer (from the piano demolition) to my uncle. His trees were also spectacular. I couldn't resist a photo or two.

The Piano Demolition

For those of you not on Facebook, here are a few photos of the Great Piano Demolition from yesterday. I borrowed a giant sledgehammer from Uncle J. more than a month ago, but the day was never right--too humid, too rainy or friends not available.

However, Monday a neighbor complaint letter from the city arrived in our mailbox and so I said, okay, we will show them! No more piano in the backyard of our student rental house--just a pile of piano parts!

Only O. was available yesterday but she came with a dolly, which helped us with moving the piano out into the lawn without any male assistance. She also came prepared with bare toes--pretty and polished--and so appropriate for a sledgehammer miss! And with gloves (see photo) that were never put on.

Everything is in pieces that would fit into my trash can except for the sounding board. Who wants a unique art piece? Scrap metal? I have all the black keys in a bucket. Craft ideas, anyone?

No one was hurt in this episode of Crazy Adventures with my Senior Friends, but don't try this at home!

We had a little accompanying Music of the Strings with each blow. It was loud enough (or was it our laughter?) that old Wayne from across the street was compelled to amble over to see what was happening.

I do wonder what the city inspector will say now.

Is this still a piano in yard??

And you are wondering why there was a piano rotting away in the backyard? Well, that is another story.

NYC - Dirt and Delights (and Goodness, MARTHA!)

There is almost nothing one cannot find (or have delivered--even Costco delivers!) within a few blocks of a NYC apartment (or so it seems in my limited experience visiting the Upper East Side): good things--AND things that the masses of humans and dogs (trying to bump around together) bring to the city...

I'm sure that over time one comes to overlook the garbage piled high street-side, the sidewalks stained with gum and puppy poo and the grates to the underground world emitting nose-scrunching scents from sewers which must accommodate, for one thing, the massive load of 8 million people pooping!

Heading three dirty levels down to catch a downtown train and then standing up close and personal with strangers--that too is all in a day's business.

But when you come up for air you might just find yourself in Grand Central Station. How cool is that? We only took the time to visit the Market there, and only purchased two macarons from Eli's. But, how good were they? There are no words for my surprise at first bite (having tasted them in several cities before) ... these were at another level of seriously chewy goodness, purchased in a little oasis a few floors above the hub of dirty tracks below.

While a macaron was not on my list, something from the Martha Stewart Cafe was on my (minor) list of things to do in NYC! Martha's big old building is near the end of the elevated garden path that is the High Line, which we traversed for a little over a mile on a Monday afternoon. The High Line is clean, above the city streets, and covered in natural vegetation that was fading to fall in a good way.

Coming down off the High Line, we walked a very short distance on sidewalks congested with construction and dirty with activity (and goodness knows, not where one would expect to encounter Martha Stewart!), and yet, as we entered the lobby of her building, there she was--or at least, there we found a tiny corner of Martha-ness, with multiple brews and baristas, and of course, baked goods. I purchased a small Martha's Blend coffee and an oatmeal cookie. M. got a salted chocolate buckwheat cookie thing. We went back up three flights of stairs to sit on the benches of the High Line to enjoy, since Martha provided no place to sit. The prices were modest for NYC. Everything was well-named, with cool fonts and careful presentations--but it was a tiny corner of a good thing, right in the middle of an historically industrial and meat-packing area, which apparently is being renewed.

My son-in-law held up my instagram-worthy cookie in a ray of sunshine over the grates of the High Line. The cookie was rich with pecans, dried cherries and white chocolate. Martha has selected some of her favorite bakeries to supply her cafe--this one from the Brooklyn Bakery--and it was a very good thing!

There was a clean tray of multiple milk products. I chose the half and half. Who would dare to spill at Martha's and not wipe it up!  One blogger suggested that Big Martha might be looking down from the multiple camera feeds above.

In case you didn't know, I object to the enjoy on Martha's otherwise well-designed cups, although it did not have that annoying command to enjoy dictated by an exclamation point!!

Well, that's about it for this visit to NYC!

Sorry that I did not have a way to include--in the good themes of this post--the warm gooeyness of a NY-style bagel, or the breakfast club with bacon and avocado that I enjoyed at the Cluny Cafe in the West Village. The Cluny Cafe, located in a quiet, wealthy and cleaner neighborhood of NYC, offered only skim milk (never! rather have it black) for my coffee, and it was not as good as at Martha's Cafe. But the Cluny Cafe does not have that pretentious diacritical French acute accent mark over the e--and Martha's does--making it impossible to type easily on a QWERTY keyboard.

After all that, I will throw in just one more pic anyway ... of my breakfast club sandwich:

Fall in NYC

Library at NY Botanical Garden

Because New York City is a little more temperate than West Michigan and the fall changes were still in progress, I (along with my NYC kids) was inclined to find outdoor things to do on this visit.

And--when I arrived by taxi from La Guardia airport on Friday evening it was that perfect 72 degree temperature which I live and die for. We tried to do dinner on the street again--but we all became so hungry waiting that we walked to Shake Shack and scarfed down hamburgers and fries with Shackmeister ale at one of their outdoor tables--not fancy, or French--but on my list for NYC to do's ever since I learned of this NY phenomenon while visiting a pristine new Winter Park, FL outcropping this past spring.

The next day we took the subway to the Union Square Farmer's Market. It was jacket weather now, but we sipped hot apple cider and had fun finding food for dinner--duck breast, miniature butternut squash and vegetables in a rainbow of colors. I found some pheasant sausage and buffalo cheese (actually labneh from water buffalo!) which took me back to thoughts of my home state of South Dakota.

So I will include a photo of our market haul and the dinner we ate. We watched a documentary about a NY chef and how some of these new vegetables (like honey nut butternut squash) come to be--from collaboration between the farmer and the chef. I confess that even though I dozed through a bit of it, I always enjoy learning more about food and farmers!

On Sunday we tried out a new brunch place in the neighborhood, Bocado Cafe. Remarkably, everyone loved their choices. I had pancakes with caramelized apples, blueberries in whipped cream and strawberries for color--very elegant and tasty! (I kept my camera in my purse, for once!)

Then we took the subway to East Harlem (not on my NYC list!) and walked a few blocks to the Metro North train. It was a challenge finding which track would take us to the NY Botanical Garden. If it had been up to me I would probably have ended up stranded somewhere in Connecticut.

The train stop for the Gardens was right at the entrance, but we walked and walked through both older and more newly planted sections of the gardens, in addition to taking the tram around and stopping at the cafe for a sandwich. We left the indoor gardens of the conservatory--and much more--for the next visit, but (unexpectedly) happened on a live demonstration of birds of prey.

A small indoor display featured *amazingly perfect mums of all kinds, mostly? Japanese cultivars, including this one:

Chrysanthemum 'Megumi'

The gardens provided us with a perfect fall walk in the woods, although I found more concentrated beauty in the gardens and along the walkways of Carl Schurz Park in the neighborhood where I was staying and also in the gardens of the High Line.

Yes, on Monday we walked the gardens of the High Line (google it!) that have been created from/on old railroad tracks. I will highlight only one specimen, out of the thousands that have been planted and maintained there--the juniper, which is prominently featured on the walkway and loaded with berries (for the birds). One can adopt a juniper for $50 and help to support the maintenance of this delightful city walk.

Juniperus Virginiana - Eastern Redcedar

These are some of the highlights of the outdoor fall beauty that we enjoyed in and around the "concrete jungle" of New York City. I will include a few more culinary delights that had not so much to do with nature or the outdoors in a future post, although that breakfast club I had in the West Village was pretty "farm to table" and that oatmeal cookie I had with my Martha's Blend coffee at the Martha Stewart Cafe--that must have had some pretty darn good natural farm products in it as well...

*amazingly, used with apology

Grand Haven - Angry Waves on the Big Lake

The sea was angry today, my friends. Adventurous souls that we are, O. and I went to take a look for ourselves. My photos were not all that dramatic, but I have never seen the waves of Lake Michigan splashing so violently over piers and barricades. It was windy and so I pulled my scarf up over my blowing hair and cold ears--and then, of course, someone deemed that photo-worthy!

Back from New York

Contractor bags are great!

Today I plunged right back into bagging leaves. Although the trees in NYC were still mostly green and leafy, here in my yard, even the red maple was newly barren when I returned, and so I bagged the plush pile of gorgeous red leaves and dumped them at the yard waste facility. Tomorrow is predicted to be wet and stormy, so no time to waste.

So nice to have something available for free (with taxes).

I followed O. with her loaded vehicle. After navigating the crazy-busy dump we stopped for a bun-less burger on the way home, as is the tradition!

I also managed today to wash off the taint of the dirty city that is New York. Most of my clothes needed freshening from the suitcase anyway, and you know I love to wash...

I am a bit out of sync and almost missed choir, which had been rescheduled for 6:30 with our intern.

Once again, I have so many new and interesting (to me at least!) photos and thoughts of NYC. We explored new territory and neighborhoods ... and I even crossed off a few minor things from my to-do list.

I am thinking about what to include in a post, and will surely publish something soon!

Fall is here but WINTER is just around the corner!

A few clouds today over the red maple.

As the days shorten and the sunlight recedes I sometimes stress out a little about getting things done before WINTER comes--when things like cleaning out the garage or planting tulips are usually abandoned for the season.

That's where I am now. Panic mode. So what am I doing? Flying to NYC!

 December is always busy but I usually completely veg away the month of January. Early in the new year I will be alone for at least 10 days. I feel like I would actually welcome the cold boredom of a Michigan winter right now! Last year I told my friends I was hibernating for a few weeks.

Perhaps I will read a few novels. That would be novel!

The Discovery Tour will be over and I will have to think up some new things to look forward to in the new year...so far I have nothing planned! Yikes! Just more of the same--maybe a weekend in NYC or Orlando to break the routine at some point in early Spring.

But, oh where will we make room for the books, etc. that will come home when the husband vacates his office in June? That is a new wrinkle--THE HUSBAND IS RETIRING.

The fall has recently included that Traverse City trip, the church garden pull-out and pizza party, a funeral in the Chicago suburbs, a book club event here with 14 for dinner, and now a trip to NYC tomorrow! So, some fun is sandwiched in-between the busyness and perceived (self-inflicted) stress.

I have my (two) lawns mowed and mulched and blown and bagged as of yesterday, but last year I still mulched the leaves--and the husband golfed--on the day before Christmas! It's never over until it's over! There is still a pile of giant sawed-down yews, leftover deck wood, and much more in the backyard!

But the deck is complete! Sanding happens today and sealing will be next summer when the treated wood dries out sufficiently. The rest of the backyard, which needs a complete makeover, contrasts now with the beautiful new deck. I am already imagining a concert/karaoke night/fundraiser/theatre on our massive stage of a deck! Grass seed, shrubs, patio stones, flower pots, table with umbrella and chairs, a dumpster, and a new shed needed first! Not to mention a new gas grill...

Please let it snow now. I think I need a long winter's nap.