Show and Tell Friday...

I've been paying heavily for letting the housework slide for a month.  Holy crap, at one point I wondered if a woman can drop dead from too much cleaning...and yeah, I pretty much think you could.  Still, house is now back in order.  Woo-flipping-hoo.

I've put off some pressing business and the soon-to-be urgent Christmas shopping until next week, because, hey, I'm just one little person and can only do so much.  Okay, only want to do so much...

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Yesterday I finished the last of the turkey by making a most excellent soup, with dumplings.  I always feel so, I don't know...nostalgic?...wistful?...when I make a recipe that comes from my mom (soup) or grandmother (dumplings).  Every bite last night was filled with kid memories, sitting around our big kitchen table with my two sisters and the Golden Child--otherwise known as my baby brother. We were a wild bunch, and I smiled a lot while savoring my soup, remembering.

I had to buy some fresh veg for the soup and whilst grocery shopping yesterday morning, I just couldn't resist the huge display of Poinsettias.  I found a small pinkish-red one with delicate, ruffled leaves that said take me home.  So I did.

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The gloaming last night was almost surreal as the valley filled with fog, undulating like waves in a wispy sea.  The colors were shades of blue and lavender, gray and white.  And very beautiful...




The weather has been damp and foggy for days--typical December climate for this area.  Today it's dense and thick, dripping like rain off the eaves, the trees.  I decided not to take the boys down the mountain for their hike, so instead we walked our one lane road.  The dogs took a right out of the driveway and totally missed what was standing barely ten feet away to the left.

Although, she was kind of hard to see...

So was the house as we made our way back home.  I know it's near that bend in the road...somewhere...

I love the fragrant scent of pines, but these oaks, all gnarly and twisted, are my favorites, especially in the fog...












As the dogs ran ahead, I stopped to look closer at the trees, moss-covered and eerie, glittering with Nature's Christmas baubles..

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I really and truly plan to sit down and read a book this afternoon.  I've hit some kind of snag: started five books, set them down after a short perusal.  One paragraph or one chapter, nothing is working. I think the story I'm writing is still rattling around in my head and I can't concentrate or something. Cripes, who knows.

In any case, it's time to jump into the weekend, peeps.  I'm taking it easy, hoping to find the right book to break the curse, because after waiting for a solid month to read, I'm finding it irritatingly ironic that now I can't.  Go figure.