Random?

This morning I took the The Girl to the train. It was lovely to have her home for the past 2 weeks. She decorated the house and helped a lot with the Christmas stuff. It had snowed overnight, I suggested that we leave a little early, then we were early enough to stop for some extra caffeine and a bit of breakfast for The Girl.

What happened next was the most 'random' thing. I have been meaning visit my friend J. There were opportunities to see her but I hesitated each time coming up with some sort of excuse and then feeling guilty. As I got out of the car in the parking lot of the train station there was J. Random? We had a moment to speak to each other, I said all I could say to her we hugged and parted.

When 'opportunities' like this happen, are they truly random? Or is it part of some great plan, I wonder?

It's New Year's Eve, the end of 2009, for our family a year filled with great opportunities and adventure, mostly good things; but for others this was a year filled with tragedy and sorrow. I think of them often.

Twenty Ten sounds like a whole new beginning; a chance to start again with a blank page.
I hope your twenty ten brings all good things!

Alright Everyone, get back to your knitting!

We watched 'The Goblet of Fire' last night. Those who are obsessed with the movie might recognise the line, those who are obsessed with knitting will be surprised by it.

Christmas is done, well the dinners, the guests and the chaos; now just the returns, completing gifts and the cleanup. We ended up having a Christmas dinner at our house, which worked out quite well. It just created a bit of strategic cleanup and menu planning. My family were terrific, they helped to organise the house and make the clutter go away. (Just don't look downstairs.)

This is the couch I found at the Salvation Army a couple of years ago. We have been trying to save up enough to purchase a new one for this area in our family room but every time we have just about enough money saved up for a new couch, something happens, usually involving a dental procedure. Since then its been known affectionately as my knitting nest. Yesterday, for the first time in about 2 years you could actually have 2 people sit on it. As you can see I have already slipped into my old habits, 24 hours later!

If you look carefully you can see 3 projects on the go!

Time to get back to a more normal schedule and look forward to new things for twenty ten, but you will excuse me as I take a few lazy days to catch up.

Hours are posted at the sidebar, Thursday I won't open until 11 ish and I am closing early.

I'll be home for Christmas...

It's Christmas Eve, I am here at the shop thinking about all the things left to do! Fortunately I have a very understanding family. Tomorrow we will sleep in and be together just the 4 of us.

This past week has been hectic to say the least. We were down to one vehicle, with 4 drivers, all who had stuff to do. We opted one night to borrow Nana's wheels which meant a 'quick' moonlight walk for my husband and I. He remarked at the frosty temperature and I reminded him that only a little while ago he would have thought this as a great night for skating on the pond with the kids!


Christmas shopping for me became virtually impossible in the fact that I was never alone, except when I was at the shop. I have sent the youngest out to get 'refreshments' from Archibald's . I think it is completely wrong that both children are of 'legal' age.



Tonight I will be wrapping gifts of yarn and needles. (You would think that after 30 years of working in retail in one form or another that I would get this right.) Working on projects after Christmas has always been my best knitting opportunity.


This is beginning of my true Christmas Season; it will continue until I take the tree down on January 6th. I will listen to Christmas music, light candles to bring back the sun and spend time with family and eat and drink a little.



Thank you to all my new friends who come and visit me.
To all of you who took the time to send cards and notes, thank-you.

Merry Christmas.


(Christmas and New Year's hours are posted in the sidebar.)

All I Want for Christmas!

Remember when the kids were seven and they were happy to sing about their two front teeth!

What do I want for Christmas! Every year my husband says that finding a Christmas gift for me is the hardest thing he has to do. Forget the crops, the chores, climbing up and down 60 foot silos, doing endless repairs to equipment, milking 40 cows twice a day and being able to help deliver calves at any time of day, yet gifts to me are the most difficult!

Maybe I am picky, or just that I don't require much. I'm not a consumer of goods, a few good clothes, some nice shoes, I like what I like?

This Christmas I will be just happy to be home with our family. It's been a long year with both kids away for big chunks of time.

This year I will be thinking of those families who have lost important people in their lives.
We know of 2 families who are preparing funerals, both tragic and unexpected, therefore I am feeling a bit melancholy.
December is a dark and dreary month, but starting today the daylight hours are becoming longer and spring and new life will be here soon.


Enjoy the time you have with family and friends.

What do I want for Christmas.....Peace, Love, Joy, Hope...and to be done the knitted gifts!

Oh Christmas Tree....

Today after much discussion we put up a Christmas Tree.

During the early years we were able to 'harvest' our own trees from the woodlot behind the house. We always had a Cedar tree which was a lovely tree for decorating. By the time we took it down on the 6th of January it was green and lush. As the years went by it was harder to find anything that was a decent shape or size, some years we meshed two trees together. One year I noticed about 6 days into the 'tree' season that some of the branches were drying up, when I commented on the problem both the girl and her dad smiled and said "we wondered how long it would take for you to notice!". Notice that they had drilled holes into the trunk of a skinny cedar and filled the holes with branches to make a very nice looking tree.

Today's 'discussion" wasn't about whether or to put up a tree or not, but more about where we were getting it. He wanted to hike into the woods to look for another Cedar. I wanted to go to Price's Country Market to look for a 'real' tree. He didn't need any extra work right now and 'the Girl" and I both worked at Price's for a few years. To me the choice was obvious.

The next hurdle was how to get it home. We are down to one vehicle under 10,000 pounds, the pick-up is in the body shop getting a new door, the wind decided to make it into a sail! We could take the tractor and trailer, the dump truck things, or find the trailer and hook it up to the car. I convinced him that if we took a blanket we could put the tree on the top of the SUV, it has roof racks! Off we headed to Price's, they had about 6 lovely specimens left so the choice was pretty easy. I was in paying for it and the other goodies when Mark volunteered to deliver the tree right to the house, how easy was that!

The Girl decorated it and it looks lovely. Now there is the 'everything' else on the list....

I haven't posted any Christmas hours, because I really haven't figured it out. I will keep you posted. I was hoping to be open a bit tomorrow but we have some stuff to do in the morning that may take up a big part of the day.

This looks like a busy week ahead, there is still time for a bit of knitting!

Westward Leading Still Proceeding...

The Olympic Flame came through Bowmanville today! We stepped outside to watch the procession come through town. First came the elephant, camels, reindeer and other assorted animals from the Bowmanville Zoo! (Only in Bowmanville can you see the Elephants out for a walk and people say: "oh look the elephants are out for a walk..like it happens all the time!)

Then came the torch and its entourage of people and vehiclesAnd then we went back inside, like wimps and watched the rest on the computer..I love high speed!

Only a few more days until....keep knitting!

City sidewalks, busy sidewalks, dressed in holiday style

The downtown is bustling with shoppers dashing around. Bowmanville has covered up the parking meters so there is free parking on the streets, but the ticket guy is still out there..no illegal parking or staying all day.


Today I received an email from the Baba Tree Basket wrangler. He went back to Ghana to get more baskets. He wrote that when he comes back to the community the prices that the other guys pay for baskets go way up because they know he will pay top dollar for these baskets. Weavers now will come to him first to see if he will buy their baskets.

I was tempted to order another bunch, but I still have a few of these lovely 'yarn holders'. Great gift with a triple purpose: Renewable resource, fair trade and great quality.

In the new year, that's only a couple of weeks away I think I will introduce a new way that we can help those in the world that could use some help. After reading yesterdays post from Seth and reading the page about dignity:

"Dignity is more important than wealth. It’s going to be a long, long time before we can make everyone on earth wealthy, but we can help people find dignity this year (right now if we choose to)."Jacqueline Novogratz is the founder of the Acumen Fund and author of "The Blue Sweater".

Just thinking aloud.

Hope you are getting things done!