Ecclesiastes Gets Ready to Paint, While Waving the Grand Old Flag

I got a call a back in April from the RS presidency in my old stake, asking me to present a workshop at the stake Home, Family, and Personal Enrichment meeting this month. The theme is taken from Ecclesiastes 3:1-8, which was incorporated into this lovely song by The Byrds.

And I am to teach on “A Time to Pluck-Up”, which seems entirely appropriate, as I have so recently plucked up roots and set them down in a new portion of the Lord’s vineyard. The idea is that we are to embrace change and accept where we are and make the most of it. I have done better with this at some times than at others. So if all else fails, I can tell them what *not* to do.

I love to write, and I love to teach. Ideas have been pouring into my head almost faster than I can write them down. I’ve submitted the material for my handout; now it’s just a matter of deciding which props and stories to use, where to ask for comments, etc.

I woke up a little past 3:00 yesterday. Couldn’t begin to tell you why. So I got up and knitted a few rows on Juno Regina, and then I came out to the kitchen and fixed myself a bowl of granola with strawberries. How satisfying to toss the trimmed bits into my compost container! An hour or so later, I was done reading email and not quite in the mood to pick up my needles, so I sliced one geriatric shallot [bought weeks before the move and then forgotten] and set the other one aside for compost. A splash of olive oil, a bit of butter, and the last of the chicken stock from the bean jollop that I made on Sunday. Voila! Risotto. Being single means that I can have a bowl of risotto at 5:25am, with nobody to raise an eyebrow or complain about my breath.

I think I know what I want to do along one wall in the living room. First I need to reassemble the last two cheapie bookcases. Their backs came off in transit, and they are staggering like Foster Brooks. [I’ve only had tee martoonies...] One will go here.



And one will go here.



And the computer desk will go in between. Now I just need to find a clear space large enough to attack the backs of those bookcases with my trusty staple gun. Maybe on top of my bed? That would bring them up to a comfortable working height and eliminate the problem of getting down on my knees to work and then having to get back up again.

One of my friends at work wanted to do something for my new home. And I really didn’t need more stuff. I told her that since she lived in a big old house in a little bitty town, with all kinds of mature trees on her property, if she had an empty nest in one of the trees, I would like that.



She brought it to work yesterday. Here it is sitting in a candy dish from my yard sale china, which I am trying to acquire more of on eBay, only turns out it is obscenely expensive if you didn’t get it at a yard sale in the Texas Hill Country. Like $300!!!!! for a funny looking rack in which to perch your toast so that it doesn’t wilt. [For that kind of money I could buy the Reynolds “Baby” to knit a particular jacket in one of my books, which jacket has been languishing on my Ravelry queue for months because I cannot find an acceptable substitute. I think I can live with wilted toast!] I bought 25 pieces for $50, which we could barely afford at the time. I used to have seven plates for the seven of us, when there were still seven of us. Now I have five plates, but I’m not about to do away with one of the kids. I’m sure they’ll be happy to read that.

I stopped and picked up a few paint chips on the way home from work last night. Here they are en masse.



As soon as I find my painter’s tape, which I definitely know was not left behind at the old place but is also not in my tool box, I will dot them on my bedroom wall like designer chicken pox and live with them for awhile. I’m not sure what color I want for the other three walls in my room. I’ll deal with that later. I have the feeling that this place is going to get repainted one wall at a time. The girls have offered to help, and I may take them up on that, but I may also just do it myself as a working meditation.

I’m going to be here awhile. I have time.

The fireworks this week [after the nightly concerts in the park] have been getting louder and longer. I timed an errand last night so that I left the house after the second or third BOOM! Could have sat in my car in front of the house and watched, but I wanted to be a little closer. So I drove down to the parking lot across from the Dairy Queen and oohed and ahhed and darn near cried.

I love fireworks. Not the kind that you have when you have six women living in one small house, and four of them are cycling more or less together so that you have PMSx4 in roughly ten days, but the kind that go up in the sky and set off the car alarms. It was funny. BOOM! woop woop BOOM! BOOM! woop woop woop BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! [big finale] BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! woop woop woop woop woop woop woop woop woop woop dogs barking, kids blowing whistles, people cheering.

Good times. Can’t wait for the parade later this morning and the potluck at the home of a new friend and more fireworks tonight. But first I’m going to knit while the tub fills. Big tub. Will take awhile!

[I wonder where my John Phillip Sousa cassette is? Or my Scott Joplin?]