It's a beautiful day! Stunning! Gorgeous! Unbelievable for the middle of November. It's 66F and pure blue sky. No jackets needed. The only thing not fun about today was starting it with a mammogram early this morning. :-)

On Tuesday Curt, Barb, Dennis and I went to our friend Amanda's who just had surgery. Her gutters desperately needed cleaning out before the snow falls. So the two old men of the church volunteered to do the job on her HUGE old three story house. Here is a photo of my very filthy, dirty husband out on the roof. Curt was holding the rope while Dennis dangled outside. Meanwhile Barb and I visited with Amanda. I'm glad I didn't see what was going on up on the roof or I may have had a panic attack. These two guys can get themselves into pickles for sure. Last week they spent two days replacing windows at our youth minister's house. Usually they volunteer at the mission on Tuesday and Wednesday but the drop off donation spot was closed for Veteran's Day so they did the gutters instead. Yesterday he spent 10 hours t the mission grocery center giving out food. I'm married to a great guy. I really don't know what I did to deserve this saint of a man but I'm very grateful to the Lord for blessing me with him as my husband.

I finished another pair of socks into the Christmas basket. One more to go. These are Knit Picks Felici in the "Silent Film" color way. Plain vanilla pattern of course. I think it shows off the Felici stripes best.

Now on the needles are another pair of Felici in "Sanderson" named after the sisters in the Halloween movie. Another plain vanilla pair of socks. I'm boring, I know.

A blast from the past photo that I found on my phone from when our girls, Lizzie and Zoey were puppies. Aren't they just the cutest little things? They still are and we love them so much.

As I said in the beginning, I had my mammogram and the results already arrived online. All is fine for another year. I just want it known that I do NOT enjoy that test at all. Especially since I got my pacemaker. It's very, very painful where the pacemaker is squeezed. It was not pleasant before but now is another whole level of pain.

Tonight is our annual condo meeting and tomorrow Dennis and a few other guys from here are going to repair the fence around the property to try to save several thousand dollars. Our HOA fees are going up around $100 a month next year anyway simply because of insurance. We have had no claims in over 10 years, but because of all of the natural disasters around the country, our premium is going up too. So some of the guys said, we can fix the fence to save everyone some money. He likes keeping busy too. :-)

Otherwise not a lot has been happening. I'm still trying to get things done before we leave. I'm done with Christmas cards and they're ready to go into the mail after Thanksgiving. I need to wrap gifts for the people here and finish the last pair of socks for a gift. I think I'm on track for being done but who really knows?

Take care my dear friends and enjoy your day. Hopefully it's as pretty as it is here.

Blessings and love,

Betsy

Beautiful Fall Days

Happy Wednesday! It's so hard to believe that it's November 5 already. I have so much to do in the next month before our trip to London, if it even happens with the state of the world and the airports. Who knows what will be occurring in the next few weeks? I need to finish all of my Christmas preparations as well as get cards ready to go out before we leave. Meanwhile, I have doors and windows open, because it's so beautiful outside today and I can see all of the beautiful leaves turning color from my chair where I'm typing this post. 

I'm still struggling with posting on the computer. Not that the computer isn't cooperating. It's me. It's all me. The new hard drive is working well so far. But I can't get the photos to line up correctly. It's a long process to get them from my phone to the computer and then onto the blog itself. The iPad was SO easy to use to post. I have great, great respect for those of you who post daily. So far I've been working on this post for over an hour and it was just getting photos on here! Hopefully I'll get faster with more experience using the laptop.

But first, I thought I would share some of my fall decor with you. I put it out the first week in October. I don't decorate for Halloween so everything I put out is appropriate for both October and November.      

On the kitchen island is the beautiful tray that my blog friend, Pamela's son made for me for my birthday last year.  I really love this tray and it's perfect for decorating for the seasons. The black thing in the corner is a battery pack for the lights inside the birdcage.

The cabinet under the television is always fun to decorate.

Over the fireplace.

Have any of you seen these screen savers on YouTube? They have hundreds for all seasons and they make your television look like a painting, complete with a picture frame. I like to have one of these on the TV when we have company, instead just a big black screen on the wall.

I ordered this solar light for our son Alex's garden on my Amazon UK account. It makes giving gifts to our family there so easy. To mail a box is ridiculously expensive where this is just like ordering from Amazon here in the States. I ordered this and it was delivered the next day! It's a little watering can. I chose one with bunnies on it because I thought "Baby J" would like them. Alex loves to garden and he can see this  from his desk when he's working in his backyard office. His birthday is Dec. 7 so it's a little early but he'll be in Japan on his actual birthday so we just sent it a bit early so he could enjoy it now. They have a small garden as is normal when you live in the middle of London so this seemed to be the perfect size.

Dennis spent the day at the food bank today and now is at our associate minister's house helping him install a new window. He likes keeping busy and his almost 50 years of home ownership projects come in handy for helping others.  Meanwhile I spent the day vacuuming, dusting, giving Zoey a bath, and will soon be knitting on another Christmas gift. I put a roast/potatoes/carrots in the crockpot this morning so dinner will be ready whenever he gets home and is ready to eat. I'm debating making biscuits to go with it.  We're trying to cut back on carbs, but how can I pass on homemade biscuits with a roast?

I finished the hat/scarf set below for "Baby J" on Monday. Both the pieces together only took one day to complete. The color should match her school uniform and was requested by Mom and Dad.

Well, since it took so long to get this written, I better get busy and finish up so I can get a few more things done around here. I hope you all have a wonderful week and enjoy the fall. 

Blessings and hugs,

Betsy

Many of you seemed to enjoy the last video I posted. Here's another that I really like from Phil Wickham called "Homesick for Heaven". I hope it blesses your heart like it does mine. I can't wait to dance with David too. :-)

Happy Wednesday to everyone! It's been a rainy, cool week so far here in the midwest of the USA. I'm enjoying the break from the heat and humidity we had all summer, but not too excited to hear the weather people using the detested four letter word-snow. The long range forecast is saying possibly next week! Oh no. Not ready for that at all.

So far my back seems to be doing much, much better after the ablation last week. I even did some chair exercises yesterday trying to strengthen the muscles a bit. I'm starting out just every other day because I don't want to be too aggressive and be back where I was, unable to do much at all.

Dennis is at the Mission today, distributing groceries and I'm just doing a few things around the house. Yesterday I finished the Christmas ornaments for the kids and grandkids, sewing them up and stuffing them. I'll take a photo and show you after the holidays since I don't want them to see the chosen design before they open them.

I also finished a sock I began on Sunday. I'll start the second today. Here are the socks I've finished since I last blogged. All are plain vanilla as I'm in production mode!

These are the five prayer shawls I have finished. I mistakenly said I finished six in a previous post. Oops! I  must have miscounted and now I still have another five to make. I used the Iris crochet stitch for most of these, maybe all. I can't remember!

A few of you commented on the fact that we bought a double kayak. Here's a photo of it when we inflated it in our bedroom to make sure it held the air. We didn't want to miss the return date if it was defective and we probably won't use it much until spring. Many of you shared that you wouldn't be getting in a kayak. I feel the same. To tell you the truth, I'm terrified. I do not like water and can't swim. I do like boats though and Dennis bought be a brand new life-jacket and promises to rescue me if I fall in! :-) He really wants to do this but won't go with our friends without me because he doesn't want me feeling left out. He's missed SO much the past several years because of my back, so I'm determined to at least give this a try for him. He is an amazing guy and I'm so glad I've got him by my side through this crazy life.

See the tan sock on the dresser? Somehow the washer or dryer ate it's mate. I'm hoping it will show up and Dennis can have a matching pair again. :-)

I thought I would share a photo of the table by our entryway. I enjoy the fall decorations around the apartment and usually put them up the beginning of October and leave them through Thanksgiving at the end of November. In December, Christmas decor usually appears but I think that since we'll be gone, I probably won't decorate this year. Just the nativity will be put up, because you really can't forget the reason we're celebrating can you, and I'll leave it out for awhile when we return home.

I was asked if we'll return to London next spring when the baby is born. We haven't talked about it, but much will be decided by the price of the airline tickets. They can fluctuate wildly, depending on many factors, so we'll need to decide that closer to the time.

I hope you're all doing well. The world is continuing to continue it's crazy course so I just keep praying, knowing that ultimately the Lord is in control and works all things for the good of those who know Him. I do hope you know Him too. He is the source of peace and joy and I can't imagine living in these troubled days without Him by my side, loving me. Stay well and I'll be back soon!

Blessings and hugs,

Betsy

We sang this song in church Sunday for the first time and I fell in love with it. I hope you like it too.