The Awesome Power of Technology

Technology is wonderful.  Until it isn't. 

I am thrilled to be a crafter in the age of Pinterest and Facebook.  I love all the recipe sites I use.  I learn so much online and have improved my skills and been inspired in a thousand ways.

But the truth is, it is also my greatest enemy.  It steals my time, splinters my attention, and distracts me from getting things done.

I'm working on this, and I think finding the right balance is a challenge for a lot of people.  I would love to hear what you do to keep your online time in check.

Today my problem wasn't about being distracted though.  After working perfectly for years, my printer just stopped.  The laptop couldn't find it.  My print jobs got stuck somewhere in Neverland.  I did what I always do and googled the problem.  Ouch.  It seems this is a common problem these days with Windows 10.

I tried things.  Then walked down the hall to the printer - which currently lives in Jungle Boy's room - to see that it was sitting there serenely, not printing a thing.  Back to my laptop.  Back down the hall.  Back to the laptop.  Called down the hall to Jungle Boy to tell me if it printed.  Back to the laptop (why didn't I just take the laptop to Jungle Boy's room?  Have you seen Jungle Boy's room?)

This went on for a solid two days.  My googling skills improved as I found new ways to frame the problem.  I sifted through so many message boards and web sites and help pages (always the least helpful) until finally I found a page written by someone who had my exact problem who could explain in a clear step-by-step way how to fix it.

I feel like a technology goddess now.  Only don't ask me how I did it. 

NASA found water on Mars today, and I got my printer to work.  Technology is awesome.

Autumn Woods mini quilt

I had a spare couple of hours yesterday morning so I made this bow-tie mini quilt from a charm pack of "Autumn Woods" fabrics.  I love the muted colors.  Next month I'm taking a hand quilting class so I'm going to set this aside until after that.  I like to quilt the little ones by hand.  I'm looking forward to a refresher on techniques.

On the home front, our dishwasher appears to be on its last legs.  I'm in denial, but we've used it daily for about ten years.  The last time a technician came out, he said we should only be running it twice a week.  Was he kidding?  We have to run it every day around here.  Maybe other people eat out a lot more than we do.  Or do they use paper plates?  I can't even imagine.

So there are two courses of action; let my husband go to an appliance store, where somebody will easily talk him into something, or take it into my own hands and do extensive research, which may or may not come up with the same model.  I can spend forever and make myself crazy comparing features and checking consumer magazines. 

I'm guessing it's not going to be free, either. I'm still in sticker shock over all the little incidental expenses to get a daughter started at college.  What can you do though?

Do you have a favorite brand of dishwasher to recommend?

The business of making a grownup

I thought graduation was a big milestone, but this week I've learned that there are quite a few more steps required to get Drama Girl officially into the land of the grownups.

She needs a real i.d. card.  She chose not to learn how to drive, so we went to the DMV to get her an official card.  Two hours of waiting later, we were done with that task.  It should come in the mail in a few weeks.

Next:  a passport for her travels to Scotland next year.  I had made an appointment at the post office to get a passport and I still had her birth certificate in hand, so this should be easy, right?  In a word, no.  The passport office only accepts "official" birth certificates.  We had a "certified abstract of birth," which apparently was just fine for the department of motor vehicles to issue her an official i.d., but not good enough for a passport.  So I've spent the money to get a new birth certificate mailed to me.  Then we'll make another appointment and try all of this again.

Drama Girl had a check that she needed to sign over to me.  Simple, right?  Just stop in the bank and have a teller do whatever she needs to do.  Nope.  Turns out Drama Girl had a "teen" bank account which wouldn't let her do that, so we spent two more hours switching her to a "college" account.

Then a trip to the school district office to get her a work permit.  More waiting. 

Then a trip to the library to pay off the last of her overdue fines.  $39.25 left.  I paid and told her it's the last of her graduation gifts from me.  It probably isn't.

Then today, a very bittersweet goodbye.  It was her last visit with the pediatrician who has been her doctor since birth.

How do you thank someone who has traveled this whole road with you?  I think I might send a card, or maybe even flowers.  I'm sure somewhere I have a picture of Drama Girl's first checkup when this doctor held her.  Makes me a little teary to think about.

It also made me realize that there's so much we need our kids to remember; "get your tetanus shot every 10 years" "see a dentist regularly."  All these things that I remember being totally clueless about when I went out into the world.  It's wonderful that now they give us her complete medical history on a CD.  Wish I could also record all the family medical history and give that to her.  Perhaps a project for another day.

Back home, we're working through forms for student loans, health insurance, etc.  There is so much to do.  We're bonding over bureaucracy.

How NOT to drive.

I have tried to be so good with the kids lately.  Teaching them everything about traffic safety and how to drive carefully.  Trying to be a good role model as a driver.  I want them to be good drivers.  But yesterday I gave my son a thorough lesson in how not to drive.

I had two tickets to San Francisco ballet's Nutcracker.  I've had these tickets for months and I had the date in my calendar.  For some reason I didn't bother to write down the time, so imagine my surprise when I pulled the tickets out yesterday morning and saw that they were matinee tickets.  Curtain time 2:00.

This shouldn't be a problem.  The kids were done with finals at 12:20 that day.  If they got right to the car and we whizzed home, they could grab what they needed and I could drop the girls and be on the road by 12:30 with Jungle Boy.  Plenty of time to make it to San Francisco Opera House.  I texted each of the kids and pleaded with them to go straight to the car after school.  I got out a change of clothes for Jungle Boy.  I changed and made it to the pickup spot in plenty of time.

Drama Girl rushed over.  Then she was on the phone with her friend.  "Mom, I'm going to hang out with L.  She'll drop me by the house later so I can pick up my ballet stuff.  Have fun at Nutcracker!"
Great.  No problem.  One kid taken care of for the day.

Jungle Boy arrived and then, after waiting for what seemed like forever, Wasabi Girl showed up.  She hadn't read the text and had spent the usual amount of time socializing.  I checked my watch.  12:40.  It's a 40 minute drive to the Opera House.  We could still make it.

Then I couldn't get out of the parking lot.  I just needed to back out and get in the line.  Nobody would let me in.  Car after car after car.  I finally gunned my engine backed out and forced the car behind me to stop.  "um, don't ever do that kids."  Too late for regrets, I needed to go.  People are so rude.

Whizzed up the hill to the house.  "Don't drive like this!"  Into the house.  I asked Wasabi Girl if I could drop her at the deli by the gym.  She said yes so I made sandwiches for myself and Jungle Boy to eat in the car.  She came out of her room "oh a sandwich for me?"  Of course I handed it to her.  Jungle Boy had done a quick change and was gnawing on his.  Into the car we went.

Down the hill in the Titanic car.  This car is a big old minivan that requires half a football field to make a u-turn.  I've been lobbying my husband for new wheels and as part of my campaign I've covered the steering wheel and drivers seat with pink shag covers.  He does get embarrassed when he drives it but we still haven't worked out a time frame for getting a new one.  These facts will be important later in the story.

Pulled over next to the gym to drop Wasabi Girl.  Jungle Boy got a call on his phone.  It was Drama Girl.  "Put me on speaker phone!  Mom?  Mom I don't have my key and I'm locked out of the house.  I need my ballet stuff."  "What?  okay honey, I'll be right there to let you in."  Kids come first.  I panicked as I looked at the clock: 12:54.  We could still do this but it might be close.  I was still talking to Drama Girl when I noticed I was dodging a bunch of construction trucks right and left.  Construction workers were making faces at me.  Jungle Boy filled me in - "mom, you're driving through a construction zone!  I think this street is closed!"  Whoops.

Glided through the pylons and back up the hill.  Let Drama Girl in.  Back down the hill.  It was now 1:14.  "How long does your phone say it will take us to get to the Opera House?"  "39 minutes."  Okay, I'm thinking, we're probably going to be late but there is a remote chance.  Time to hit the highway.

Made it to the Opera House at 1:54.  I know there's a parking garage on the block behind it, next to the ballet school.  I dodge traffic and construction and there was the sign...LOT FULL. 

It was one of those moments.  I did one of those slow motion movie screams "NOOOOOOOOO!"  I seriously considered bagging the whole idea of getting to the ballet.   It was as if it was not meant to be.  But I have tickets and determination.  I know there's an underground lot a few blocks behind us at City Hall.  Of course I'm now in the land of one-way streets all going the wrong way from where I want to go.  Finally at the underground lot I pull up to the window.  The bored attendant points to the ticket dispenser that I have somehow driven right past.  Back up, take ticket.  Don't panic.  Try to find a spot now.

There are dark parking garages and then there is this subterranean pit that my headlights could barely penetrate.  I can't imagine how depressing it must be to be the attendant working down there.  We cruise around.  Obviously there aren't going to be any free spaces on the first level.  I look all over before I found the ramp down.  It's one of those tight corkscrew ramps.  Titanic car and I hate those.  Down we went and began searching the next level.

One space.  Next to a cement post, with the car next to it crowding the free space.  "I can't park here Jungle Boy, I'll never get Titanic car in there."  But then the other half of my brain kicked in and told me to do it anyway.  I have tickets to see the Nutcracker and I want to see the Nutcracker!   About eight swipes later I'm in, with that post about 2 inches from the side of my car.  I will never get this thing out again.

Up the elevator and into the blinding light.  Walk one long city block and the Opera House is in sight.  It's 1:59. 

Between us and the opera house is a sea of hundreds of kids with matching shirts proclaiming they are from some middle school.  Seriously?  Tall Jungle Boy took the lead and cut a path as we weaved through them.

2:01 in the door.  The calm usher scanned our tickets.  "Has it started?" "Yes, but we're still seating people."  I nearly cried with relief.  We had excellent orchestra level seats.  I felt terrible about scooting in front of half a row of people but just so relieved to be there.

The production was fabulous.  The snow scene started well, with beautiful falling snow.  Then I think something went wrong with the snow machine because it became a total blizzard on stage.  You could barely see the first row of dancers, and nothing of the rows behind. Jungle Boy and I both burst out laughing. Of course nobody else was.

After the show, it took me another eight swipes to get the car out of that space without hitting anything.  It was a nightmare.

At this point I was absolutely starving, since I'd given my sandwich to Wasabi Girl earlier.  Back when I was thinking it was going to be an evening performance, my husband had suggested that Jungle Boy and I have a nice dinner. Seemed like a good plan now.

We pulled into a nice restaurant that was valet-parking only.   The valet came up to us "Do you have reservations?  The restaurant is full tonight."  It was 5:00 on a Wednesday.  Give me a break.  Jungle Boy took charge.  "Wait here mom, I'll check inside."  A minute later he was back out, waving me in.  The valet gave me my claim ticket and we had a marvelous dinner.

It was only later that I realized the valet probably just didn't want to drive Titanic Car.  I'm still laughing.

The Email Problem

I wasn't born with the technology my children use every day.  But living in Silicon Valley, I learned to use email back at the dawn of time.  I picked an email address for myself and kept it.  Still the one I use today.

I check my email 3-4 times a day.  Sometimes from my phone, sometimes from my Kindle.  I have a work email that I check at least once a day (my job isn't very urgent).

I guess not everyone is like me.

Over the years, I've used a great site called Evite.com to send invitations to our annual cookie party.  When the kids were little, I sent invitations to their parents, who sent replies.  I knew exactly who was coming, who had seen the invitation and hadn't replied, and those who couldn't come could send a note to me.  It's one of my favorite tools when planning a party.

This year I used Evite again.  But the kids are teenagers.  I had a lot of their email addresses, my kids got the rest, and I sent quite a few copies of the invitation to their parents - just to be sure they got them.

Over a third of these families never opened the email over the course of over two weeks.  I'm just amazed.  My three tell me that email is old-fashioned and kids don't use it any more.  Are you kidding me?  I must be an old idiot because I don't see how you can survive without email.

What makes me sad is how many adults on my list didn't open the invitation either.  People keep changing their email.  Why?  How am I supposed to find their new email address?  I've lost them.

So yes, next year the invitations go out in the mail.  On paper.  Guess what?  Evite is offering real paper invitations as an option now.  Live and learn I guess.

Now go check your email.  And tell all your friends when you change your address.

He Said It

by threeundertwo related [litandlaundry.blogspot.com]

Just as predicted yesterday, we braved the mud and massive puddles to pick out our tree. It doesn't take as long as it used to.  Now the three teenagers glance around, mumble "this one's fine" and ask if they can wait in the warm car.

Then the inevitable complaining from Jungle Boy about carrying it up the stairs into the front door.  The yearly ritual of husband asking "is it straight?  how about now?"  over and over while we pretend he has to keep moving it around in the base.

Then the family scatters while Wasabi Girl and I fuss with the lights and ornaments. 

Then the biggest challenge of all.  The Christmas train.

Who invented this tradition?  We both love and hate our Christmas train.  We're on at least our third model now.  This one was a gift to Wasabi Girl a few years ago.  She had been in tears when the previous incarnation broke beyond repair.  Since this is her train, it falls on her to set it up.  And by setting up, I mean reconnecting the tracks a hundred times when one part or another comes apart, finding the right batteries for the engine and remote, and getting the cars to stay on the tracks.

Once she was done, she played with that train for the rest of the evening.  Forward, reverse, forward again.  She has more fun with it than any of the rest of us.  I'm scared to touch it for fear I'll just mess it up.

With the living room complete, she sat down to practice  In this shot you can see Scrooge sitting on a pile of Dickens and other Christmas books, and I just noticed the sky out the windows is sort of an awesome color.  My two amaryllis are in full bloom.

I love Christmas.

The Dark Side of Chain Piecing

Chain piecing is a great quilting technique.  Line up the series of pieces and do them all at once.  No cutting thread in between so it's fast and efficient.

For my Christmas quilt I needed a bunch of little triangles sewn together.  No problem!  I've got this!  So between shuttling kids around in the car yesterday, doing laundry, and cooking dinner I made a long lovely chain of sewn triangles that looked like this:

Great stuff!  Just needed to press them and get them ready to trim:

Yay!  Lots of little triangles sewn together.  A good days work.

Except.

They weren't supposed to be sewn long sides together.  They were supposed to have short sides sewn together.  Since I chain pieced them, I managed to make the same mistake about 60 times.  Go me.  This nice little pile of half-square triangles got put into a bag to be used someday for something else.

Back to the cutting board today.  A million more tiny triangles.

See?  Short sides together with a big triangle attached.  Now they're ready for trimming.   I know yesterday I said I thought I was done making mistakes on this quilt.  Now I'm not so sure.  Obviously I need to pay better attention to what I'm doing.

My amaryllis bulbs tell me Christmas is coming.  Their holiday pots are covered up because I don't like Christmas decorations to come out before Thanksgiving.  The bulb on the right looks like it wants to open soon though. 

We finally turned the heat on and I put both cat beds by a vent.  They opted to share one though.  Hestia brought along a toy. 

Santa's Village #10

I am using every spare minute to get this finished.  One more chart on hand and I think the last one is on the way. This one is the "Gingerbread Emporium."  I think it's funny that the suggested thread has a slight variegation.  Makes the gingerbread men in front of the house look like they have burnt spots.  I would never burn my gingerbread men!

Nine weeks until Christmas!  This will get done.  Then I'm swearing off pattern-of-the-month projects.  (I hope...)

My dishwasher is dying.  Sometimes it decides to work, and sometimes it doesn't.  Days get so busy that sometimes it's just easier to wash everything by hand rather than try to trust it and restart it when it poops out.  With the amount of dishes we use, I need to run it every day.  According to the last repairman who came out, you're not supposed to run them that often.  Whoever decided that didn't have a family that cooked and ate real meals together. 

I haven't shopped for a dishwasher in many years.  I can't imagine what they cost.  *sigh*  I hate projects like this.  Any advice is welcome!

Everything Changes

Do I look different? I feel like I do. A few days ago my six year old laptop turned up its toes and died. It wasn't a happy day. All I got was a blank screen. Even with all the clever tricks I know, I couldn't resuscitate it. So I looked online (on my smartphone) for help. That place that rhymes with "zest guy" quoted $250 for diagnostic and data recovery. Ouch. I turned to Yelp. One guy was really highly rated, and ironically, has a shop just behind zest guy. First thing Monday morning I packed up my dead laptop and headed out.

Now I can insert a long story here about this guy who drove up on his awesome motorcycle just as I pulled up. His old curiosity shop with a murky aquarium and high tech clutter mixed with vintage weirdness. I could tell you about cables that didn't fit my external hard drive, a trip to yet another quirky computer guy who had my daughter's hard drive and cable - that guy had a shop full of birds of all kinds, one of which wouldn't stop wolf-whistling at me. I could have stopped in there for hours just to talk about the exotic lutes he had on display. What is it with colorful computer repairmen? Anyway, it's a typical story of the bizarre world hidden behind the shop fronts I drive by every day.

In the end, with a cable that worked, he was able to take all my data off my laptop. Between all these trips around town, I stopped into zest guy and bought a generic, somewhat cheap laptop. It does about 10x what my old expensive laptop was able to do.

And now I am completely lost.

Windows 8. Do you have it? You can't get a computer without it these days. It's a bit bizarre. I'm trying to be patient while I learn but one wrong swipe of the mouse or keystroke and I am suddenly three screens away from where I was.

 Also, this keyboard is about a millimeter different from my old one. I seriously have to retrain my fingers to type. It's taken a lot of effort just to get the periods to show up on this page.

I had some pictures to go with this post. I haven't gotten my camera software to load yet though.

Perhaps most frustrating of all, this laptop doesn't know me. I suddenly find I have to remember a million passwords, some of which I haven't entered in years.

So - happy to have new technology at my fingertips, but not really enjoying the process of getting up to speed with it.

 I miss my old dinosaur laptop. I've turned into one of those people.

On a desert island

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Sometimes it feels like a desert island around here.  We've been having a lot of trouble with our internet connection.  As I type this I'm looking at the router and its internet light is red.  I have several tabs on my browser spinning around trying to load.  Then they do.  Then they stop.  It's so aggravating.  I've spent hours with a customer assistance person with the lovely but unlikely name of "Autumn" trying to troubleshoot everything.

Of course, when she checks from her end, everything is fine.  *sigh.*

I've moved that router all over the house.  I'm going to try attaching it to the ceiling with duct tape next I think.

I've been thinking today about how I've grown so dependent on wifi. Living without it, even for short periods, feels like I imagine it must feel to be marooned on a desert island.  How would I find vintage needlepoint kits on ebay?  Or sync my calendar up across my phone and laptop and kindle?  How would I find well-tested recipes?  How would I load even more books onto my kindle?  And how could I possibly live without Pinterest??

Let's hope it never comes to that.  And while I'm on the topic of troubleshooting, let me remind everyone that google reader is going away in July.  Obviously they didn't ask me if that's okay.  I think it's a big mistake.  I'm jumping on the bandwagon with other bloggers an using Bloglovin.  Click on the link at the top of this post and you can migrate your feeds too.  If you don't use a reader yet, let me recommend it as a great way to stay in touch with the blogs you enjoy.

Now I'm off to find the duct tape.

Not making my Monday

We've had quite a rainstorm over the past few days.  All the leaves torn off trees, howling winds.  I thought how lucky we were to be all safe and cozy inside.  I considered reading Jane Eyre again - because it seems like such a good book for a storm.

Sunday morning Jungle Boy woke up with water dripping on his head.  One interior wall was soaked and the water was dripping from the ceiling and around his window.  The eaves above his room come to a "V" and the gutters couldn't handle the sheer volume of water.

I feel so lucky that our wonderful neighbor, who is a contractor, answered our call for advice and came right over.  He helped both outside and in.  Here's what Jungle Boy's room looks like right now.  Today the sun is shining out his window.

Our neighbor tore out some of the damaged drywall and insulation.  Then he created this tent so the heat from the vent would dry out the area.  Reminds me of the movie "ET."

Jungle Boy is managing with his bed and things in his room moved around.  Hopefully when all is dry in a few days we can get in there to do repairs.  Last thing we need during a busy month!

Hope your Monday is going better.  I'm off to make some cookies for the neighbors...

Design Wall Monday: 12 Farmer's Wife Blocks

I'm moving right along with my hot pink Farmer's Wife Quilt.  I'm having so much fun with this.  I just flip through the pages and do whichever block strikes my fancy at the moment.  I've still been too lazy to start printing out templates.  Everything you see is just done by calculation and stitch-and-flip.

Math skills are great - until they let you down.

See this block?  Isn't it gorgeous?  I did my calculations and spent some time making it  I was so proud.

Until I realized the completed block is only five inches instead of six.

Argh.  This one goes in the orphan block pile.  Possibly to become a cute pin cushion or something someday.

Design Wall Monday is hosted by Judy at Patchwork Times.

Busy?

It's 2:00 in the afternoon.  A typical afternoon.  What's ahead today?

2:30 pick up twins from middle school. Drive home.

3:30 pick up Drama Girl from middle school, where she has been tutoring, drop Wasabi Girl at gymnastics.  Drive home.

5:00 feed Jungle Boy and Drama Girl early dinner.

6:00 drop off Jungle Boy at ballet.

6:15 drop off Drama Girl at Improv performance.

6:30 pick up Wasabi Girl from gymnastics. Drive home.

7:00 Feed Wasabi Girl dinner.

8:30 pick up Jungle Boy from ballet.  Drive home.

9-ish or whenever she's done and calls me - pick up Drama Girl and drive her home.

Collapse.

I'm looking forward to my husband returning from his business trip.  Not just because I miss him, but because he can help drive.

If I even get one load of laundry in between all these trips I will consider this day a great success.

Finished for Friday: Nine bags full

This week is another finish in the "massive cleaning" department.  Since Jungle Boy is off to study ballet for a month at ABT, I took advantage of his absence to go through his room and clean it out.

His room didn't look bad to begin with, but once I got in there it turned into a much bigger job than I anticipated.  Stuff under the bed, stuff stuffed in drawers, stuff everywhere.  I started out with an empty bag for trash and an empty bag for items to donate.

It isn't hard to fill a donation bag when you have a kid who's grown about six inches in six months. His voice has changed now, and his tastes and sensibilities have done a lot of growing as well.  The Hungry Hungry Hippos game in the closet had to go, along with Candyland and a stack of other games that had been forgotten in there for years.  All the shirts that only skim his midriff went into bags, and all of those half-finished lego models that were missing the rest of the pieces.

The closet was like an archeological dig.  The hobby horses and jigsaw puzzles (60 pieces!) and long-sleeve shirts that now only go past his elbows all went into bags.  The more I pulled out, the more things seemed to multiply.

Then I found ballet tights.  Then another pair, and another.  Men's tights are almost like pants - thick and sturdy and about $24 each.  Oh look, another pair - had they been multiplying in the back of a dark drawer?  After I pulled out six pairs I jumped in the car and sent them to him UPS.  He told me later on the phone he doesn't think he needs them but I'd rather he have too many pairs than too few.  I was a little annoyed that he didn't check his drawers carefully enough when he was packing.  Boys!

In the end, I had six bags of items for the thrift store and three bags to go out with the garbage.  I spared some things he needs to sort through himself.  I bought a new mattress pad and pillow and did everything I could to freshen up the place.

Many hours and sore back and hip later, the room doesn't look very different, but it's better equipped for my big teenager.  If I did my job right, he probably wont even notice.

What have you been up to this week?  Link up so I can visit and congratulate you.  Feel free to grab the button from my sidebar.

Finished for Friday: How to Make a Hamburger Costume

I have an untarnished record when it comes to Halloween costumes.  I have never made one.  I have scrounged thrift stores and eBay for components, I have helped assemble them, I have purchased prepackaged Darth Vaders and Hogwarts robes.

But this year my resolve faltered when Jungle Boy begged me to make him a hamburger costume.  My solution?  I supervised him while he made it.  This totally counts as a Finished for Friday.  It was no small feat to get this done between us.  It would have been 10x faster to do it myself.

 First, cut out some circles of cardboard.  Ignore mom when she says they're too big.  Cut out the felt slightly  larger than the top bun.  Thread a needle with mom's pearl cotton (because it's strong) and baste all around the edge.

 Rip open the bag of stuffing.  Ignore mom when she says to just open one end.  Fluff it out everywhere because it's fun.  Put a bunch of stuffing between the fabric and the cardboard.  Ignore lumps.

Flip it over. Stop for now and run off to 3-hour ballet class, leaving huge mess in the family room.

Come back the next day and wrap fabric around a cardboard circle for the bottom bun.  Use super glue and clamp it with mom's big bag of quilting clamps.  Be sure to wear the same sweatshirt you wore yesterday.  In fact, just wear that sweatshirt every day.  Ignore mom's pleas to wear a different one.

Cut some tomatoes out of felt, being careful to avoid whiskers as you go.

Glue them to the cardboard, and put some weight on them.  My son used a cat.

Cut out a bunch of lettuce and cheese.  Forget the glue now and attach it the manly way - with duct tape.

 Use leftover scraps to make a goofy hat.  Put on a brown shirt.  Suddenly remember you have a lower locker and there is no way you are going to be able to get into it today.

Few words can convey how exhausted we all were after the process of creating this costume.  One of us, at least, had to take a break.

  Thanks for playing along and Happy Halloween!

Desperate Times

Fall means one thing. No not exciting baseball games. Not back to school. Not flannel sheets on the bed. Sure those things happen in the fall, but there is one important event that overshadows all of them.

Making pumpkin bread.  You can keep your pumpkin pie, give me some pumpkin bread.  Maybe with nuts in it.  Or mini chocolate chips.  Or just plain.  I might even get crazy and put a little cream cheese on it.

But if you follow important trends like canned pumpkin supplies, you know that last year there was a canned pumpkin shortage.  People were buying it on eBay for $7 a can.  But this year, according to reports, pumpkin would again line the shelves of our favorite stores.

Let's not talk about buying a real pumpkin and all that - I'm not Martha.  If I can't find pumpkin in a can the kids get banana bread again.  In fact, the kids are so in love with banana bread that they leave the last 3 bananas in the bowl to turn black just so I'll make it.  But back to pumpkins.

I found canned pumpkin in one local store last week.  Overjoyed, I bought a can and raced home and mixed up a batch of pumpkin bread.  Which I completely messed up.  Because I didn't measure the flour correctly my husband hasn't hooked my computer back up to the printer so I had to write down the recipe by hand and I miscopied it.  Clearly his fault.

The house smelled wonderful - which really killed everyone in the family who walked in the kitchen and couldn't find any pumpkin bread to eat.  But I was determined, and hungry, so I grabbed my car keys and headed out to get some more pumpkin.

None. Nada.  Zip.  No pumpkin for miles.  Until today.  I went back to a store and found a shelf full of the small cans.  The big cans were all gone.  I thought I showed admirable self-restraint by only buying four.  I toyed with the idea of putting on a disguise and returning later to get more.  Desperate times call for desperate measures.

I might just go back tomorrow.  You know, if I happen to be in the area.  Just to look.  Maybe just pick up one or two.

Please tell me you've done this

I don't think of myself as particularly scatterbrained.  I plan my weeks and days, make lists, organize the glasses in the cupboard by size.  But it seems I've had more than a few forehead-slapping moments lately.

My favorite?  Remembering to buy toilet paper.  The nice big package.  Big package.  Really big.  The kind you put in the lower shelf of the shopping cart.  Then I chanted to myself  "remember the toilet paper" on my way to the checkout line.  Maybe if I put items down there more often it wouldn't be such a big deal.

I got to the checkout line, and put the toilet paper on the conveyor belt first.  Smart me!  La La La I didn't forget!  I even had all my handmade fabric grocery bags along with me.

La La La out to the car.  La La La drove home.

You see where this is going, don't you?  Of course the bagger put the big package of toilet paper on the bottom shelf of the cart.  Which is where it still is, for all I know.  Because it never made it into the car.

I think next time I'll bring a string, and tie one end on my wrist and the other on the package of toilet paper.  Good grief.

Finished for Friday: Computer Woes

I think I'm pushing the whole "Finished for Friday" concept this week.  I've been pulling my hair out over my computer woes the past few days.  I had turned off the Captcha word with my comments.  You know, that gibberish word you have to spell out to confirm your comment?  As soon as I did, I started getting a lot of spam emails.  All of them were on old posts.  I finally had enough and decided just to add it back.

Sounded so simple.  Check the box, comments have to be left by humans again.  So I did.

Then the internet went down.  From every computer in the house. Just when a kind friend emailed me to tell me the comments weren't working.  I could read my emails on my cell phone but I'm a complete klutz at working on my blog from there.

It took three days and a wonderful husband to get the internet back in business, and a helpful friend to test the comments while I fiddled with them a few different ways.  Now I have hundreds of emails to catch up on and some blog posts I want to write.  It sure is good to be "home" on my laptop again.

I hope you have some more interesting finishes for this week.  I promise to be back next week with something colorful and more fulfilling.  Show us what you've been up to and leave a comment...if you can.

I'm Such a Spammer - learn from me!

Sad to say, my email was hijacked last night and sent spam to everybody on my contact list.  And I mean everybody.

• The mayor and various city council members (I've served with them on a nonprofit committee).
• The listserver for my kids' middle school (probably 700 or so recipients there via a single address)
• All the wonderful tutors I've worked with for years
• Old college and high school friends

I'm mortified.  The email was inviting them to check out a "great site for electronics."  It was so poorly written that it was somewhat obvious that it was not written by a native English speaker.

I debated sending out a follow-up apologetic email but I didn't, because I think that's almost making things worse.

What did I learn?  Obviously I needed a better password.  How good is yours?  Check it here:

https://www.microsoft.com/protect/fraud/passwords/checker.aspx

I also need to change passwords more often, I get pretty lazy about that.

I also learned that I got an awful lot of undeliverable mail back.  A lot of my contacts have changed email and not notified me.  Do you let people know when you switch email?

I also found out that there's a universally recommended free tool to check your computer for harmful invaders.  Get it at Malwarebytes.org.  It didn't find anything on mine, but apparently it's pretty good at finding the nasty stuff regular software like McAfee can't. 

So.  Did you check your password?

Wordful Wednesday: Muffin

Dear family,

It was so nice of you to tell me, as you were jogging out the door to work and school, that you had left a muffin for me. How sweet.

However, I was sort of expecting a whole muffin. *sniff*

Wordful Wednesday is hosted by Angie at Seven Clown Circus.