When we moved to Spokane, the movers couldn’t believe how many boxes of books we had. They said they had never moved another household with as many books as our family had! In my mind, that’s a good thing.
A few people asked what I was going to do with the advent mini-socks. I plan to crochet them onto a chain and then hang them across our slide-out in the RV. Maybe someday I will have a fireplace mantle again to hang them on. I wanted to put numbers on them somehow, but I’m not sure how to do that. Do you have any ideas? I thought about just sewing the numbers with white yarn. And then I thought about buying numbered buttons to sew on, but I haven’t had luck finding any yet. Jenny has kindly offered to fill the socks with little things. I’m going to give her the money and she’s going to fill them so I can be surprised every day! She offered to do this for me. Isn’t she the sweetest best friend?
Alicia called me about an hour ago. Apparently all four of them have Covid. Their neighbor has it and the kids were at their house playing at the end of last week. This other family rarely leaves the mountain either and they were in each other’s “bubble,” but the neighbor had to go to Idaho last week. So far they seem to have mild cases. All have fevers and are achy and Alicia has lost her sense of taste and smell. If you would pray for them I would appreciate it. They sure mean a lot to Dennis and I and I hate to think of them sick.
Jenny also called me this evening and said that she and Neal were both tested today too. She has a cough and so needs to be tested before she can go back to work. She is the person who trains the caregivers for an in-home elder care company. She can’t be around them if she’s sick, so they have to make sure it’s not Covid. She thinks it’s just a sinus drainage thing and I sure hope so too.
It seems it’s getting harder and harder to not have contact with someone who has Covid, so many people are sick. I guess all we can do is the best we can do, right?
My big project today was organizing all of the food that I brought into the trailer when we moved in. It was such a rush to move and I basically just threw everything anywhere it would fit. I wanted to have things more organized where like items were together. I had started stocking up a little bit at a time way back in January when Alex warned us of what was probably coming based on what was happening there. Nothing big like you saw some people on the news. I would just buy a few extra cans of vegetables or fruit or beans, etc., every time I went to the store throughout the spring and early summer. We had a nice little stockpile going on. Nothing huge, but it would keep us going for quite awhile if stores ran out of things. Then we moved into the camper. Whoa! Where was I going to put all of this food? Well there’s an empty spot under the sofa where you usually keep blankets. I have lots of canned goods there. From the two blue lids (peanut butter,) to the right, is a double layer of canned goods. ⬇️ I wrote on the top of every can what was inside. That way I can see at a glance without having to shuffle through them all.
This doesn’t even begin to count what I have in the pantry and in the big closet in our bedroom. There are over 100 cans of beans, fruit, soup and tomato sauce in the closet. I also have all of my baking supplies, and meats, rice, syrup, spices, salad dressing, and on and on stored in there. I would be willing to guess we could live a good six months on the food we have. Of course, when I was buying all of this we had no idea we would be living in an RV. I definitely will not be buying any staples in my grocery orders for quite awhile. The only things purchased will be fresh vegetables, dairy and meats. Re-organization took me most of the day today. I wrote down everything we had and how many cans, bags, boxes, etc., there were of each item. Tomorrow I will type it all into the computer and hopefully I will be able to keep track of what we actually have with a spreadsheet. I thought that all might be of interest to some of you. Do any of you have anything similar?
I have one more photo tonight. Two snowmen that I don’t think I’ve shown you yet. We ended up getting about 2 inches of snow last night, but most of it melted today as our temperature went up to 35°F. I like those kinds of snows. It falls during the night and melts away during the day and I don’t have to shovel it.❄️☃️❄️
Our family suffered another loss this morning. Dennis‘s Aunt Ev, who lived in Minnesota with her husband of almost 70 years, died this morning. She was 90 years old. She was a wonderful woman who always cared about family. Every year she would write a long, long Christmas letter catching us all up on the cousins and their kids. I will sure miss that letter. Please pray for Dennis‘s mom. This is the third sibling she has lost this year, along with her own daughter Karen. I talked to her today and she’s really having a rough time of it. It is hard to be so far away when we feel she really needs us there with her right now.
I pray that you are all safe, healthy and happy. Take care of my friends.
Blessings,
Betsy
