Christmas Traditions

I LOVE the Christmas season! I love everything about it! Most people fuss and fume over the commercialism of the season, going on and on about the effect it has on our children, making them selfish and greedy, etc., etc., etc.! Even that doesn't bother me. It never did. Since we don't watch TV, there was never any opportunity for my kids to say "I want this". I would take my kids shopping and watch what they looked at with interest, make a mental note of it and then I shopped from the list in my head. It worked perfectly every time! I never allowed my kids to make a dream list, or Santa list, or whatever they are called. And I never allowed them to show disdain or disappointment in ANY gift, no matter how large or small. Granted, there were times that we all raised our eyebrows at a gift or two, like the time the church that we were pastoring surprised the kids with gifts of their own. Janelle got the cutest little doll. The problem was, Jeren got one, too. Granted....his was a BOY doll, but he wasn't thrilled, to say the least. But.....he STILL had to say 'Thank you'!
I think the sweetest thing about the Christmas season are the family traditions that we make. Before I was married, I enjoyed the Stimmel family traditions. After I married, I became a part of the Miles traditions. But, Ken and I realized that we and our children were a family unit all of our own and we needed our own set of traditions. We borrowed some from our childhood memories and created others, just for us. These are things that our kids have looked forward to every year, even now that they are grown. Some traditions have been archived, such as the advent calendar. This daily calendar of surprises, leading us to the anticipation of the coming nativity, requires daily participation. Both kids have outgrown that, especially since Jeren is not here every day. So, it is now a fond memory. But we still have stockings, which we dive into on Christmas Eve. We still take one evening, preferably a snowy one, to roam the countryside looking for the most beautifully decorated homes. We still bake and decorate cookies together and we still drive across snowy roads and sit on frosty benches to watch the live nativity at one of the local churches. We go to see Scrooge's Christmas Carol EVERY year at the big Church of God and then have a party afterward at our house where we enjoy the warm fellowship of good friends. Lots of love, lots of laughter, lots of JOY!
As I'm writing this blog in the cozy comfort of my family room, I am watching it snow! It's just the perfect day to decorate the house, which is what I am getting ready to do....another tradition of ours....a Christmas Tree in EVERY ROOM! The Christmas music is ready to be turned on, the house is toasty warm and I'm rearin' to get to my traditions! Hope your Christmas is as full of happiness and fun as mine!

Nostalgic Musings!

I told myself that I was NOT going to do this. NO TRIPS DOWN MEMORIES LANE THIS YEAR!! But I didn't recognize a voice of authority and I can't seem to help myself, so here I am!
Autumn is ABSOLUTELY my most favorite season of the year. I am very much as seasonal person, enjoying all the changes each one brings as I watch the landscape around me change daily. But Autumn.......ahhhh......NOTHING compares to the glorious colors and wonderful smells that IT brings! Now, if you find this subject to be boring and pointless, let me suggest that you log off now, because I have picked up too much momentum to stop!
I guess that autumn brings out the farm girl in me, big time!! This season is the farmer's last big HURRAH before the howling winds of winter force him to park his equipment and seek some other activity to occupy his mind and hands. I can still smell the dry, dusty chaff that filled the air as my Daddy maneuvered his big John Deere combine through acres and acres of soybeans, clearing the land so neatly that it looked cleaned and swept. Mom and I would fry chicken and put together a wonderful supper that we would take to the fields so that Dad could keep right on working...."making hay while the sun shines", as he put it. After he ate, I would ride with him, watching row after row of harvested crops go into the insatiable mouth of that monstrous machine. I never tired of it and I still love to ride the combine to this day. I have been tempted to stop one of my poor, unsuspecting neighbors and ask if I can ride a round or two.....but I'm afraid they would forever fear the 'crazy woman' and be scarred for life. So, I just watch from my barn lot, drinking in the sights, sounds and smells of autumn....feeling a little homesick, a little nostalgic and a WHOLE LOT BLESSED!!

She was just a little dog...!

She was just a little dog, but she had woven herself into our lives and our affections with an undeniable charisma. She could charm her way into getting anything she wanted. With her buff colored, silky fur and her huge brown eyes, her floppy ears that never, ever, really stood up straight and her tail that curled like a corkscrew on the end, she was just too cute for words. She came into our lives when she was 6 weeks old, a tiny little thing from the humane society, ready for all the love we had to give. Technically, she was Jeren's little dog. But Jeren is a busy college boy, not always able to give her the attention she wanted. Her life in the apartment, this semester, consisted of early morning runs, then 12 hours in her crate until Jeren got home from classes. She'd get another run outside, then back to the apartment where she tried to get her boy to play with her, in and around all the homework. So.....she got to stay with us, on the farm, for a few weeks. We had so much fun with her, throwing things for her to fetch, wrestling with her on the bed, and being the constant recipients of all the love she had to give. She had the run of the farm and I would often catch her back in the pasture, running ahead of the horses as if her life depended on it, which it probably did! She was everybody's darling and Jeren's special little girl. Her name was Buffy and we lost her today to a reckless driver who was speeding down our road. We will miss this little furry bundle of energy and fun. She will be forever in our hearts! She was just a little dog, but she leaves behind a giant hole that nothing else will ever fill!

A Perfect Evening!!

There are some things in this life that simply defy explanation. They have to be experienced for a person to truly understand their meaning. Last night was one of those instances. Not that last night was anything new! It started out to be a repeat of what has gone on at this farm for the past seven years. I start by picking a date for our annual bonfire and then sitting down at my computer with my trusty little PrintShop cd's to create a cute invitation. I carefully compile my guest list, TRYING to keep in mind that I have limited room, here. Each year that list has grown a little bigger as I try to squeeze just one more important person in........and there always seems to be room. This year was really a stretch, with the list growing to include over 40 adults and at least 12 children under the age of 6!! But people are just SO IMPORTANT to me, ya know?!? Then there's the mad dash from store to store, looking for unique decorations, the best deals on paper products and the biggest sale on food. Then the FUN begins. After the RSVP's start rolling in, I choose the soups that I will be making. This is always a very big deal!! I cook up three large pots of soup, have plenty of hot dogs and sausages on hand, along with all the fixin's for smores! Ken brings in a load of wood for a roaring fire and several bales of straw for comfortable sitting. Corn hole games are set up and the anticipation of a great time builds as people begin to trickle in for the fun, food and fellowship. This is what we do every year. It's as important to us as Thanksgiving, Christmas and the Fourth of July! So, what made THIS year so perfect? I'm not really sure!!! All the major elements of our party remained the same. But, somehow, the atmosphere of this one was different. This night was very nearly perfect. The wind was not blowing at all. The sky was bright with stars, the air was crisp and the bonfire, with it's glowing coals and drifting sparks, was the perfect backdrop for the cozy fellowship that we all enjoyed. As I wandered among the guests, listening to our friends laughing together and ssharing our good life, I thanked God for giving us the perfect evening......and great friends!!

Sleepless In the Midwest!

I'm hot and I can't sleep! The temperature is that perfect blend of heat and chill which renders the central air conditioning practically useless. It's just cool enough to keep it from coming on and just warm enough for me to be up in the middle of the night writing this blog. As I write, I can't help but think back to when I was a kid, living on a farm in the midwest and sweltering through the days and nights of hot August. Very few homes had air-conditioning, let alone CENTRAL AIR! But we DID have fans. Big, heavy metal things that took a handtruck to move from room to room and made conversation impossible if the day was hot enough for that fan to be turned on high! We had one of those. It was big, boxy and blue. It was supposed to be designed to make life more comfortable by violently stirring the air into a frenzy when it was place in a room. Now, I have no problems with a good, stiff breeze blowing through the house, but I prefer my breezes to be on the quiet side. I prefer QUIET when I am trying to read, write or work in various ways. And I definately prefer QUIET when I am supposed to be sleeping. Mom would haul that blue monstrosity upstairs, plug it in and turn it on HIGH so that the air would circulate through both rooms. In the upstairs, in the middle of the night, in the midst of a bad case of insomnia, that thing would roar and rumble like a bi-plane with a bad miss in the engine. Just when you thought you had caught a rythm and were about to be lulled to sleep by it, the sound would change and you'd have to start all over again. I was glad when that fan died!
My mother mourned it's loss for years. She bought another blue box fan, but it had too much plastic on it, it was too light and it made very little noise. Therefore, it COULD NOT put out a good breeze. She complained bitterly summer after summer! But I......well, I couldn't help myself.....I clapped for joy (on the inside, where Mom couldn't see) when they hauled that fan to the dump! And I climbed the stairs and went to sleep, which is what I'm gonna try to do right now if I can ever get cooled down!!!

Sarah Casey, new friend!

I can't believe that I am about to admit my total ignorance for all the world to see, but hey.....what's a girl to do? I AM in the dark most of the time about anything that has to do with the computer, or emailing, or anything else that can't be done with a Bic pen and a notebook! I am scratching and clawing my way into the 21st century with all of it's cyber-stuff and, believe me, I am leaving behind an unsightly trail of mess-ups and confusion. So, having said all that, I now move on the the 'revealing of the ignorant'! Some of you have been kind enough to leave nice comments on some of my blogs. I recognize most of you.....Melanie, Pam, Sherry, etc., but I have a great desire to find out who the new friend is that left her comments about Buffy, the granddog. Sarah Casey is her name and she sounds just like the kind of person that I like to have for a friend. Sarah, you left me a very sweet message and I would really like to correspond with you, but...........I can't find you!! Your second message told me that you would mark the email box, or some such thing as that, but.......and here is where I show my complete ignorance....
I have NO CLUE where to find such a thing. I have double clicked everything that could be clicked and a bunch of stuff that just ignored me when it WAS clicked. Nothing....not good.... not good at all. So, I'm asking for a little help from Sarah. If you read my blog again, PLEASE let me know how to contact you. I'm all about friends and you sound like you might just fit that description. And the rest of you.......don't just sit there!! If you know about this email box thingy, HELP ME!! I've fallen into a blog and I can't get up!!!

Exercise is VERY unhealthy!

They say it's never too late to start being health consious and the first two steps are learning to eat right and getting plenty of exercise. The eating right part is pretty standard around our house. We have been eating right for a good many years and it has really begun to show. All that healthy eating has spread my middle aged body out into shapes and places it should never be. After catching one too many glimpses of myself in the mirror and jumping in fright that there was a walrus in my bedroom, I figured it was time to team the 'eating right' with the 'exercise'. Now, I used to exercise religiously as a young, thin, agile woman. I could just slip right back into old habits and the end result would be .......... well, who knows? But, how hard could it be. Yeah......right!! My toe touches ended just below my knees and THAT was a stretch.
My sit-ups made me realize that my sphincter muscle was weaker that I thought and I thought it was pretty bad to begin with. And jumping jacks now danced all the figurines off their shelves. OK......so I need to change course here, just a little. I got myself a dvd, an exercise ball and 'the STEP' (as advertised on TV, or so they say). I was so excited about my new plan. I made sure that no humans were within 4 miles of me, dressed myself in my hottub shorts and shirt, popped in the dvd and proceeded to ......................................fall right off that ridiculous 'Step'. Now, you tell me how a person is supposed to watch the dvd, following the instructor who is going twice as fast as a jackrabbit AND be able to see that your feet are correctly landing on a tiny little plastic step. So, now I had a twisted hip and a sprained ankle to complete my new exercise program with. Oh, well! I'll skip to the ball. I could sit, or lay, on it. This looked like a workable plan to me. Not so simple. Balls are round! I am round! Two round things together do not make for pleasant circumstances. I fell off the ball.......more than once. Therefore, I have come to the conclusion that exercising is dangerous and very unhealthy unless, of course, you are already a size 2 and primed for the olympics. (Which I most definately am NOT)