Saturday Afternoon Tea

Saturday Afternoon Chat: The Husband was in a play, it was too cloudy for the eclipse, and we had a hint of spring.

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 9 Comments

We begin our retrospect of my week last week with last Sunday.

Why am I writing like I am a script writer for the Twilight Zone? I have no idea.

Maybe I’m just going a little squirrely because our area is still experiencing rain, cold, and wind instead of sun and warm days that I can spend on my front porch reading.

I was able to do that one day this past week and it was lovely.

We were, however, immediately plunged into cold again.

But I am jumping ahead. Let me go back to last Sunday when my family went to see The Husband in a play in a town near us.

He played a couple of different parts in a play based on the radio show War of the Worlds by Orson Wells.

It was a small cast of five very talented people who pulled the play off in brilliant fashion. It was a play within a play so it was a radio program telling the story of the original radio production of A War of the Worlds in 1938 and the aftermath. The director of the local play then tacked on a very interesting ending about how radio was a major source of news before that broadcast and then became even more of one in the subsequent years. The ending also touched on how news has become a 24/7 business now with it constantly at our fingertips, which isn’t always a good thing.

The Husband, in blue, and the man playing Orson Wells.
There is tea in the glass, not actual alcohol.
This kid is very talented.
Another very talented young woman.
The cigarettes weren’t real.

My parents were able to attend the play with us and it was the first time my mom had been out of the house since before Christmas because of her health issues and the weather.

She looked great and had a lot of fun. Dad did as well.

He found a vintage-style hat to wear for the occasion and afterward, I grabbed a photo of him and The Husband in their hats and a few photographs with Mom and Dad as well.

I also recorded a small “review” video from them afterward which was a lot of fun to make.

I’m, of course, sharing it here for you:

Dessert and drinks were offered during the play held in a large room in a community building in a town used for various events.

The Husband played an announcer and then a newspaper reporter, which was pretty much up his alley considering that’s his actual job. A former newspaper editor, a former boss of mine, portrayed Orson Wells and a couple of other parts.

When we first got there and my mom saw the program, she thought they had left The Husband’s name off and she was very indignant until I showed her where his name was.

She’s very defensive of her son-in-law, obviously.

On Monday we hoped to see some of the eclipse, even though I was nervous it might blind my children, but right when it was supposed to start, dark clouds moved in. We watched it on the TV instead and watched it get very dark outside. We were in the about 95 percent totality range where we are in Pennsylvania.

It was a very interesting experience, but would have been more interesting if we could have seen it live, I think.

The weather we could have used on Monday came Tuesday when warm, sunny weather set in. Little Miss and I spent much of the afternoon and evening outside doing schoolwork, reading, and for her, making a blanket fort on the porch swing.

By Wednesday it was raining and cold again and stayed that way the rest of the week, including today.

Luckily, we didn’t really have anywhere to go so we mostly stayed inside and did some schoolwork.

There was one creature who didn’t stay inside, however.

Wednesday night our neighbor sent us this photo:

It was taken from their doorbell camera and shows their backsteps and yard, which is about 15 feet, maybe, from our back porch.

Our neighbor told me what time the photo was taken and it was about the same time I had let our dog out the night before. She was sort of growling at something (the dog, not the neighbor) and now I know it was the bear.

So that was unsettling to find out. I now make sure to lock our outside screen door, the hinge of which was broken in some high winds a month or so ago and has been blowing open in the wind and the last thing I want is to open the inside door to look out to see if the bear is on the porch and be face-to-face with it.

While this past week was boring, next week should be a little more interesting since The Husband is on vacation and we plan to take a couple of day trips and simply spend some time together as a family. One trip will be to Reptile Land, which my daughter absolutely loved going to in the fall. She’s been waiting for months to go again.

So far, the weather is looking like it will be much warmer next week and less rainy. We will see, though, since Pennsylvania is always throwing us curve balls when it comes to weather.

Today we will be baking cookies with my mom and dad in the afternoon, after The Husband takes The Boy to see a friend who recently moved 45 minutes away.

The Boy will be spending the night and will be back tomorrow afternoon sometime.

I hope to spend my evening sipping tea and watching Lark Rise to Candleford or Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman with Little Miss since The Husband will be working.

How was your week last week?

If you are in the U.S., were you able to see the eclipse?

Did you have nice sunny weather where you were?

I’d love to hear/read about it.

Saturday Afternoon Chat: Talking in posh British accents and being silly to deal with sadness

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 9 Comments

On Fridays I drive 20 minutes to pick up my groceries through a grocery order pick up. Most weeks I leave the kids home or take our daughter to my parents and leave my son home to hang out by himself, something he doesn’t get to do very often.

This gives me almost an hour to myself to listen to music or an audio book while I drive. I usually listen to an audio book and lately that book has been dramatizations of Jane Austen novels. Right now I am on Mansfield Park.

Listening to the book led me talking back to the characters and then talking to other cars around me when I reached the “city” (slightly larger town than our town) in a very posh British accent.

Life is depressing at times and I guess being goofy provides a nice distraction. The only thing is, my doors and windows are closed when I’m doing this craziness so no one can hear me. As I left Aldi after my pickup, though, I suddenly wondered if I had been speaking in a British accent to the girl who was loading my groceries into the trunk. I don’t know if we are supposed to or not, but I always get out to help.

When I did, I remarked on how lovely the weather was that we were having. I was joking because we’d been having sleet, then clouds, then sun, then sleet all day long. Oh and it was only 37 degrees and the wind was blowing. She laughed when I made the comment about the weather but a few minutes later when I was driving down the road to go home, I couldn’t remember if I’d asked her about the weather in my normal accent or my British one.

She may have been nervously laughing at me. Like how you would laugh at a crazy person and hope that appeases them and they don’t go over the edge any further than they already have.

Hopefully she just thought I was being silly if I did use the accent. She’s waited on me long enough now to know I am a little crazy, but mostly harmless.

I sent some voice messages to my friend Erin to show her how I was talking to the drivers around me and I have to be honest – I think Erin probably starting searching online for the symptoms of a split personality.

The poor woman has got to think I am crazy.

Erin and I connected through our blogs and she’s mentioned more than once she would love to meet me in person. I truly feel she might run for the hills if she met me in person because I’m not only crazy but I look a bit like a cross between a hobbit and a troll – well, at least on the days my hair doesn’t want to cooperate like today when it was all puffed out and windblown and not windblown in a sexy model kind of way. Wind blown in a crazy woman talking in a posh British accent in small town USA way.

I played my son the voice messages I had sent to Erin in Instagram and told him I might need therapy.

“Might?” he asked.

Using the silly accents is one way I deal with stress at times and I usually only do it front of family.

I do need therapy but being silly is a type of therapy for me and this week I needed it after realizing I have a lot more trauma from my former job as a newspaper reporter than I like to admit.

A book I was reading for a blog tour triggered some of that trauma and sent me into a weird head space for a couple of days this week.

I sank further into that weird headspace when I found out that the woman who was my roommate when I was in the hospital with Covid in 2021 had passed away in November and I didn’t even know it.

She lived about an hour from me and I didn’t stay in contact with her like I should. I saw her account on Facebook and thought I’d see if she had added anything that might indicate to me she was still alive and kicking.

I’d texted her a couple of times and she’d say she was doing well.

We weren’t friends on Facebook since I’d only really known her for four days in the hospital -where I listened to her almost die a couple of times.

(You can read more about that here:  https://lisahoweler.com/2022/11/28/remembering-miracles-can-happen/  )

We weren’t really friends in real life but I should have kept up on her. I should have visited her when I visited the area where she lives.

I’m very disappointed in myself for not checking in on her more and for it taking me this long to even know she died.

I spent most of my week trying to avoid ruminating on my sadness and that probably wasn’t healthy.

As I dealt with that, my son was dealing with the fact that the woman he rescued last summer had passed away a couple of weeks ago and yesterday he ran into the woman’s daughter in the local store.

We tried to see her a couple of times but she either wasn’t home or the last time she was in the hospital and we didn’t know it.

The daughter told my son how often the family thinks of him and appreciates how he saved their mom so she could have more time with them before she passed.

That was an emotionally heavy thing for him as well.

We will try to lift some of the heaviness today by taking a family trip to a town 45 minutes away for lunch and to visit a used book sale at the library in that town.

Tomorrow we are going to watch The Husband in a play he is in. It is a reenactment of the War of the Worlds radio show and The Husband is playing a couple of different parts in the play. It should be fun.

We are also glad this weekend that my sister-in-law is recovering well after her weeklong hospital stay and is celebrating her birthday today.

The whole week wasn’t heavy, thankfully, and I was able to get some reading done and plan for some blog posts I want to write, including:

One on The Little House on the Prairie show

One on what spiedies are and their history

One on foods exclusive to Pennsylvania or our region of the state at least

One on mystery shows I recommend in addition to the ones I’ve mentioned before

One on YouTube channels I enjoy

One on the history of Nancy Drew books.

I have a lot of blog post ideas but now I need some time to write them, which will be hard since I plan to start writing the third book in the Gladwynn Grant Mystery series soon.

That was a bit about my week this past week. How was your week last week? I would love to know. Let me know in the comments.

Saturday afternoon chat and tea: Possible concussions, hospital stays for family, cold weather, and an exciting book find.

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 21 Comments

Welcome to my corner of the internet for a little chat and a cup of tea. If you don’t like tea, we also have coffee, juice, or water.

We have a small selection of teas: peppermint, Chamomile, green, Ginger with orange, and raspberry.

Let me tell you that I needed something relaxing to sip today after the week our family had. We are all okay but there has been a lot of worry over various health issues for a few of us and that has had me on edge.

Last week my sister-in-law ended up in the hospital with a health issue and only came home yesterday.

Monday my son came home from school and told me  he had run into metal piping at his vocational school and the impact had knocked his head and neck back.

He got off the bus and walked to the dollar store down the street and back home. I had no idea this had happened to him and was alarmed that he hadn’t let me know so I could pick him up at the bus stop.

He had a horrible headache and his neck hurt. He was also exhausted but he hadn’t slept well the night before. His telling me what had happened launched me into Mama Bear mode and I started asking all the routine questions about symptoms that could mean he had a concussion.

I asked him if he had blacked out, had gotten dizzy, had sensitivity to light and sound, had nausea, or had memory loss.

He didn’t have any of those and when I asked him who the president was he thought he was pretty funny when he answered “Ronald Regan.”

I kept a close eye on him the rest of the day, waking him up when he fell asleep for a nap later. We also kept him home from school the next day and also woke him up in the middle of the night, despite him saying he felt okay.

 At one point on Tuesday, he said he was very tired and I got nervous it might be because he actually had a concussion until we both started talking about how many times I had woke him up to check on him, then his dad, and then he had woke up a couple of times in the night too, plus his alarm had gone off even though he didn’t have to go to school. We decided then that he actually needed more sleep without us checking on him to feel less tired.

On Monday while I was worried about The Boy, Little Miss was dealing with a sore throat but I thought it was from sinus drainage. Later that night she developed a low grade fever. By the next morning, the fever was gone, which is something that happens with her from time to time, especially when the weather changes.

Prior to all of this, on last Friday to be specific, my sister-in-law was admitted to the hospital an hour away for a complication from an ongoing medical issue. She was doing well for the most part but it was stressful as we all waited to see what decisions would be made to solve the issue.

I tried to give her something to think about other than waiting to figure out the next step in her treatment so I texted her jokes or about books or anything else. A few days later my fingers started going numb and I realized carpal tunnel was rearing it’s ugly head from all the texting back and forth with her and my brother. I don’t regret the texting but I probably should have worn the wrist braces I’d purchased a couple of weeks earlier.

I dealt with pins and needles in my hands most of the week until I started wearing the braces more and found a video on YouTube for wrist stretches. The numbness started to subside and is doing much better. I hope I can continue to be consistent with the exercises and help the awful feeling.

Thursday I ate food that I should not have been eating because I have some food sensitivities and that night I had stomach pains and couldn’t fall asleep.

All of this is to say that I was a mess much of the week and didn’t accomplish as much as I wanted to, but did accomplish some things.

I picked up my new glasses and groceries yesterday. The glasses were very much needed because the anti-glare coating was peeling and it was making reading and writing a challenge. I was having a hard time telling what were my normal eye floaters and what were the marks on my lenses and while I tried not to focus on the spots on the lenses, it was a huge struggle.

I also finished writing Cassie, which will be released in August. I can now go over it again and then send it on to be edited. After that, I will start writing book three of the Gladwynn Grant Mysteries. I am excited to start that and announce a title sometime in the near future.

One of the more exciting events this week was when The Husband found a stack of books in the attic left by our house’s previous owner. Now, I know this makes me sound like a very lame person that I found the discovery of books in our attic to be the most exciting part of my week, but they were books from series I have either read or am reading from.

The books were four from the Mitford series by Jan Karon, four from the Elm Creek Quilter series by Jennifer Chiaverini, and a Beverly Lewis book. I’ve never read a lot of Beverly Lewis, but I have read all of the Mitford books and two of the Elm Creek Quilter books (though not any of these particular ones.)

I remember when we first looked at this house. The homeowners at the time were here and when we walked inside what is now our dining room I saw a row of Jan Karon books on a small shelf and blurted out, “Oh, I love Jan Karon! Do you read her?”

Like, she had them on her shelf. Of course, she read them and that’s what she told me with an amused smile. I have no idea why they placed some of those books in a hutch in some bags in the attic but maybe they knew we’d enjoy them.

The couple moved to Arizona from here and the husband passed away last year, which was very sad to us because they seemed like the coolest people. After we met them, I found out the man was in his early 80s and I didn’t believe it. I would have said he was in his early 70s, maybe, but not 80s.

Our neighbors on both sides said there were times they tried to talk him off ladders or from doing other dangerous things at his age.

Based on the books we found and the books she read, I think the wife and I would have got along.

Later today we are taking Little Miss to a couple of Easter egg hunts that The Husband needs to attend for work (he’s a small town newspaper reporter/editor/photographer for anyone who is new here) and then a couple of her friends are coming to visit for the day.

Tomorrow, we plan to visit my parents for Easter dinner.

As for next week, I don’t have a lot scheduled so far. I would absolutely love it if the weather got warmer but so far Spring doesn’t seem to want to come back to Pennsylvania. Our days have been cold and gloomy. We truly need some more sunshine, especially since the buds are coming out on the trees and I’m anxious to see the leaves and flowers again.

How was your week last week? Did you do anything exciting?

What are you drinking today wherever you are? I hope it’s something good!

Saturday Afternoon Chat: Punxsutawney Phil is a Pathological Liar, stinky weather, and remembering the Little House on the Prairie show

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 11 Comments

It’s time all of you Americans know something and understand it — Punxsutawney Phil is a pathological liar. That little rodent has been lying to us for years and yet people still think they can believe him when he says we’re getting an early spring.

Maybe someone, somewhere is getting an early spring but in his home state of Pennsylvania, we are not getting an early spring.

I visited Punxsutawney one time and I can confirm that it is not like the cute little town you see in the movie Groundhog Day either. They didn’t even shoot the film in Punxsutawney because the place is not picturesque and because there are actual shrines to that nasty little lying varmint all over the place.

The thing is even pictured on the outside of the newspaper building, on the newspaper masthead, and there is a wood carving of him by the McDonalds. Or there was when we visited 22 years ago.

 Living in Pennsylvania means hearing about that dumb groundhog way too often. (Hopefully, you will take all these comments about Phil in the humorous way they are meant.)

It is raining today and is supposed to rain the rest of the day but mixed into the rain is ice and snow. It was like that off and on all week this past week. So no. We are not getting an early spring, even though last week I thought we might.

That was the week my daughter was riding her bike in front of the house and my son was taking long walks around town without a coat.

Pennsylvania’s weather is like this every year but it never makes it easier.

On Wednesday we had every single type of weather imaginable it seemed. One hour it was snowing, the next raining, the next sunny, and then windy and back around again. By Wednesday night, luckily, things started to settle down some so I could take Little Miss to the last night of Kid’s Club (a children’s program at a local church) and not worry about getting stuck in it all.

After Kid’s Club, I had to rush back home to lead my online Bible study, which made me a little nervous, but I survived. Thankfully the regular leader will be back this Wednesday.

On Thursday I took a relaxation day because the week had just been so rough with that one time I had to leave the house. Ha. Ha.

 On Friday the kids and I traveled 20 minutes to pick up our groceries at the local Aldi. We also stopped at a local convenience store that used to be a mansion owned by a family tied into the area’s local history and I think maybe the underground railroad. I need to look that last part up.

Because there are some historical photographs, letters, and other information at the site, I told the kids we could count the trip as a field trip if they would go look at those items with me.

I plan to write a blog post about the site at a later date. I think it will interest history buffs, even if they aren’t local themselves.

I also plan to write a post soon about watching the Little House on the Prairie 50th anniversary events in California this weekend and what the show has meant to me. I was literally sitting here crying earlier through an interview with Melissa Gilbert this afternoon. If any of you have sentimental connections to the show and would like to see the interview too, here it is:

I have been following Dean Butler (Almanzo Wilder) and Allison Arngrim (Nellie Olson)’s podcast to get ready for the festival off and on for a few months now. It’s brought back a lot of memories of watching the reruns when I was a kid and also reading the books, of course.

I’ll ramble more about my connection to the show in a separate post but will ask today if any of my readers have heard about the reunion and if you have been watching any of it?

I plan to have a cup of tea here soon and continue reading a book I signed up for through a blog tour, though now I’m second guessing it because the book is creepy.

I’ll hopefully be able to push through it and provide a fairly good review for the tour, but as for today, I’ll probably switch to a cozy mystery I am reading later on in the day.

My cat, Pixel, is curled up next to me on the couch on this rainy day. She’s dozing away. Both she and our younger cat Scout went outside for about 20 minutes later and then darted back in when I let Zooma the Wonder Dog out to use the bathroom. They’ve been doing that a lot all week. They’re missing being able to just hang out outside.

Scout is probably curled up somewhere else in the house. She’s been making the most of the short time she’s had outside. Yesterday The Boy found what was left of a dead bird out in the yard. We call Scout our bird killer so we are certain it is her.

Zooma the Wonder Dog is slowly recovering from not feeling well (she has a lot of stomach problems), but she is lying on her side and chilling out, instead of laying on her belly and looking like she is in pain like she did on other days during the week.

She will probably perk up even more when we visit my parents tomorrow for Sunday lunch.

So that was a bit of an update about my week.

How was your week this past week? Do anything exciting or relaxing? Let me know in the comments.

Saturday Afternoon (oops…late afternoon/early evening) Chat: Injured knee, sick dog, getting the kid hooked on Dr. Quinn and Newhart

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 8 Comments

“I’m going to take a quick shower and then we’re going to do your science,” I told my 9-year-old daughter yesterday afternoon.

She looked at me with wide “innocent” eyes. “Why don’t you take a bath instead?”

“Excuse me? Are you trying to push off your science longer?”

“I’m just saying you should take some time to relax,” she responded with a serious face and a hint of a smile. “Soak your sore knee in some Epsom salts.”

I did as she suggested and she gained another half an hour of freedom, but, alas, she did not distract me to the point I did not remember that we still had her Science and History to do for her homeschool lessons.

Sometime in the week, I injured my knee by sleeping, as people in their mid-40s so often do. It was actually an issue I’d been having off and on with the knee but I guess it all finally came to a head and the pain was so severe I woke up twice in tears Wednesday and Thursday night but didn’t get ibuprofen or an ice pack like I should have since straightening the leg and relaxing the muscle helped.

During the day yesterday it felt fine, thankfully, and last night it didn’t hurt so hopefully it will heal on its own.

On Tuesday the weather was beautiful so Little Miss and I went to my parents’ house to see my brother who was visiting my parents. He wrote about the visit on his blog Unfinished Person. (https://stillanunfinishedperson.blog/2024/03/14/day-off-time-with-my-dad-and-with-family/)

He had driven over about 90 minutes from where he lives to travel with my dad to his physical therapy.

The weather was so nice that Little Miss and I sat out on my parents’ deck and I read a book while she pretended to read a book but actually searched for ladybugs to keep captive in a small dish with some grass. I’m not sure what that was about but before we left both bugs died. She has since made another terrarium to capture more ladybugs.

On Thursday the weather was nice again so Little Miss and I traveled 20 minutes to meet our friends at a playground. The kids had a lot of fun creating games on the equipment and chasing each other all over.

Later that night the little girl Little Miss played with the most developed symptoms of a stomach bug so I spent all day and night Friday waiting for one of us to throw up. So far that has not happened so I think we might be in the clear since stomach bugs are usually very contagious and hit very quickly. I’ll keep you updated *wink*. Luckily the little girl she was playing with was feeling much better the next morning too, so hopefully, it was a very quick-moving illness.

Today I am taking it easy after a stressful few days because Zooma the Wonder Dog is sick again. She has chronic colitis and other stomach issues and that has flared up again. It might have been all less stressful except I had a disagreement with our vet’s office because the vet didn’t want to give us medicine for her unless we set up an annual exam, but they said they couldn’t set up the exam right away because they were booked a couple of months out.

The problem was that our dog was sick now and needed the medicine and they weren’t offering an emergency appointment. Even if they had, we can’t really afford an office visit. If they hadn’t treated her for this same condition in the fall, I wouldn’t have asked for the medicine. They finally agreed to send the medicine by mail (since it is a 45-minute drive and she wasn’t in dire straights yet) but told us in a rather passive-aggressive and annoyed way that we had to have that annual exam before they would help again.

Today she is still not feeling well – lethargic and obviously in some sort of discomfort in her stomach, but she is acting better than she was when we thought we were going to lose her in the fall. We set up the annual exam but I probably will look for another vet in between.

I joked with my mom that I have enough issues trying to manage my own chronic illness and now I have to worry about the dog’s too. Such is life I suppose.

Gladwynn Grant Gets Her Footing is on a blog tour this week and earlier today I was tagged in the most beautiful review I have ever received for any of my books.

I plan to share a separate post about the review later on, but today I just wanted to mention how much the review meant to me. It was a bright spot in a week where I felt like I was slipping into depression. I’m overwhelmed with a lot in life and I’ve had some very good days but I’m starting to crack under the worry a bit. My mom gave me some Bible verses earlier today and they are helping as well but reading the nice review – something kind in a world that doesn’t seem very kind at times – also helped and made things feel less gloomy.

I’m not naïve enough to think that everyone who reads my book will enjoy it. I wouldn’t expect that. Not everyone enjoys the same books. On this tour I had a couple of people share about the book but not leave a review. It’s possible they forgot or it’s possible they didn’t want to leave a review because it wasn’t their cup of tea. I don’t care either way but what stands out to me is that they still shared about the book to let others know about it in case it is their cup of tea. That means a lot to me.

Cooler weather will be coming again this week so I am sure I will find myself in front of a fire at some point reading a book. I’ve been reading a lot this week but am still on the same books I’ve been reading for the last couple of weeks. It has been nice to just read for fun, which I do anyhow, but sometimes I have books I agreed to read for tours, too.

I will be starting a book for a book tour soon but I have plenty of time to read it luckily. Of course, I will ramble about what I am reading more tomorrow in my Sunday Bookends post.

As part of my relaxing today I am watching Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman and in the episode I am on, a man keeps “dying” at various places in town. Little Miss and I love to watch Newhart together with The Husband and I said that the “dead” guy looks like Tom Poston who plays George on the show. Little Miss agreed and after a few more looks we decided it was him. A quick search on Google showed that it was him. He didn’t even speak the entire episode.

Thanks to me, I think Little Miss is hooked on Dr. Quinn, and soon I’ll have her addicted to Little House. *insert evil laugh here* She’s already hooked on Newhart and when we turn on an episode she claps her hands and says, “Yeah! Newhart!” It’s so funny to see a 9-year old doing that.

I’m off for now to make some dinner and then settle in for an evening of reading books and watching either more Dr. Quinn or Little House or Lark Rise to Candleford.

What are you up to today and how was your week last week? I’d love to hear/read about it in the comments.

Saturday Afternoon Chat: Walking weather, cozy days for reading, and a fairly routine week

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 9 Comments

A cup of peppermint tea with honey, a piece of chocolate with coconut flakes, a warm blanket, and a book are the tools I have been using today as I try to relax.

Of course, I had a few household chores to do (dishes, yuck!), but otherwise, I am hoping this weekend to focus on reading and finishing the last couple of chapters of the book I am writing. Of course, after I finish it, I will have to go back and edit and do rewrites, but, hey, I’ll at least be done with the main draft.

Look at this, everyone!

The neighbor’s crocuses popped up this past week! So exciting!

Today the temperatures are falling, but on Monday the weather was nice and warm with the thermometer reaching 63. The Boy went for a five-mile walk in and around our small town earlier in the day.

I needed to get my youngest out of the house this week, so that day she and I went to my parents and had some lunch with my mom while my dad took Zooma the Wonder Dog for an impromptu walk.

Dad was planning the walk and decided Zooma could come along with him since she loves following him wherever he goes when she visits. I wish I had grabbed a photo of them walking together because Zooma really looks like she has a huge smile on her face when someone takes her on a walk.

Little Miss and The Boy took her on another walk yesterday since the weather was almost as warm as Monday and we knew today would be cold and rainy.

They took her on a walk after Little Miss and I drove 20 minutes to get our pickup order from Aldi and stopped at my parents to drop off the grocery items I had added to my order for them.

I walked a little bit down the road and the cats followed me, apparently very confused about why we had walked off the property for the first time in probably four months.

Both of their tails were puffed out so I guess they really were alarmed. Or they were having a fight between each other. Usually, those tails only puff up when they encounter an animal outside the family, though.

Today there is a book sale in a town close to where we get our groceries but I am being a good girl and not going to it. I have enough books to read – both physical and digital.

Still, I do find myself sitting here and wondering what treasures I am missing out on by not going. What if someone gave away a whole set of Nancy Drew books? Eek! The stress of it all.

I keep telling myself that I must be strong and simply grab the Nancy Drew books I haven’t read yet one at a time on Thriftbooks instead. I can do this, right?

Besides, there is an even larger book sale going on in a town 45 minutes from us in April so I will try to hold out until then.

Our area is also getting a bookstore soon. I don’t know what kind of books they will sell but it will be nice that there is a bookstore near us – even if it will be a 45-minute drive. Actually, it might be best it is that far away from me.

We don’t have a lot on tap this upcoming week but I’m sure plenty of things will come up for us to do. We are looking forward to some nicer weather so I am sure we will be at a playground at least once during the week.

How was your week last week? Do anything interesting?

What is coming up this week?

Saturday Afternoon Chat: Stormy weather, my daughter’s stuffed animal beds, and missing photography

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 11 Comments

Today it is pouring outside. It is yucky, stinky, miserable weather. Inside it is warm and cozy, even though we have not lit a fire today.

I am sipping hot cocoa and getting ready to read a book when I am done writing this blog post.

Then we are planning to visit my parents later today and have a dinner of homemade pizza with them.

The weather was, once again, the big event of the week this past week as we were given warm temperatures only to have them snatched away violently with a rain storm and then temperatures that plummeted about 17 degrees in a day.

It looks like we are going to get our early spring, however, as next week we are set to have more warm temperatures.

The day the temperatures dropped my dad and I had headed 20 minutes away for appointments. I had an eye check up so I could have my glasses replaced (the anti-glare coating is coming off the lenses) and Dad got his taxes done. Yes, very exciting appointments.

While I was in the eye doctor’s office, the wind and rain started whipping around. I had to sit and wait for Dad (who luckily didn’t chat as long as he usually does) so I was able to watch sheets of rain fly by. When we headed home there were broken tree branches across the road in some areas and right before we reached Dad’s house there was a car off the road, half into a ditch and up an embankment.

I was glad I was able to get home and make some tea and just stay in the warm house the rest of the night.

Warmer weather coming will mean I will be leaving the house more, which is something introverts don’t necessarily enjoy. Mainly I will be visiting playgrounds with my youngest and even though I don’t like leaving my cocoon of blankets on my couch I will because Little Miss absolutely needs to get outside more.

She’s been spending far too much time inside playing games on her phone while video chatting with her friends.

I’m glad she can hang out with her friends through the phone but she really needs to get out and interact more with people.

I don’t need to interact with people anymore because I did enough of that when I was younger. I’ve reached my people interacting quota so I sit in the car while she plays on the playground.

I have been trying to encourage her to do art more during the week so she is doing something a little more creative than online games – though her friends do makeup stories together as they play and are using their imagination.

I keep an eye on the games they are playing and she only has permission to talk to two friends on a private message app, in case you were wondering. You probably were not, but regular readers know how I over explain.

One way Little Miss has been entertaining herself this winter is to place her little stuffed animals in various boxes and cover them with “blankets” which are actually my dishtowels, dishcloths, and washcloths.

I thought I was missing dishcloths one day and it finally hit me that is what she was covering her animals up with.

When The Husband saw my old Teddy bear in an old Aldi box on top of our daughter’s dresser he asked if we were now doing stuffed animals funerals.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

That’s when he told me that Little Miss’s set up looked like an open casket. He had a good point so I mentioned it to Little Miss and she set Teddy up on his side instead. He looked much more comfortable then.

It is sort of creepy how all the animals are bedded down for the winter all over her room.

I took some photos so you could also feel the creepiness – er – coziness.

Speaking of photos, I hope to take more photos with my big Nikon camera soon.

I walked by it the other day and realized how much I miss it.

I miss photographing natural moments of my children’s life. I miss just having fun editing photographs and looking at other photographers’ work and just being a part of that world.

Photography was such an escape for me during some very lonely years and as I enter a stressful season of getting old and watching my parents get old, I think it will help me get through again. Writing also helps during these seasons so I will also continue to write.

I really hope to finish writing the book for the multi-author project this week. I’d like to get the first draft out of the way so I can start tightening it up and then begin to work on book three of the Gladwynn Grant Mysteries.

Writing and visiting playgrounds will probably be mainly what I do for the upcoming week.

How was your week last week? Do anything exciting or interesting?

What are your plans for this week?

Saturday Afternoon Chat: The fox was going to eat my cat and very unexpected snow

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 4 Comments

I woke up this morning with a gasp because in my dream a fox had climbed up a pole and a fence and was preparing to eat my cat.

Only it wasn’t my cat, it was my friend’s cat named Peanut.

A cat my daughter cried over for ten minutes straight last night because she says our friends are giving him away. I have no idea the background for this breakdown or this story about Peanut The Cat. All I know is I am not adopting another cat and I am not eating chocolate before bed again because it produced some really odd dreams. Not only did I dream about the fox stealthy walking across a snowy backyard that wasn’t ours so it could climb a pole and fence and eat our cat that was not really our cat, but I also dreamed about New Kids on the Block lip-syncing in concert, which yes I am sure did, and does still, happen. (Yes, they are still touring. I know. I too hope they are up on their health insurance because they might break a hip.)

I woke up from the dream before the fox ate my cat, by the way, but not before the cat in the dream let out a horrible yowl.

That yowl haunted me so I stayed up for a while scrolling Instagram before drifting off for another 20-minute snooze.

When I woke up for good, I looked outside and discovered the weather forecasters are apparently drinking booze these days because last week they prepared us three days in advance for a storm that never came and yesterday they prepared us thirty minutes in advance for two inches of snow that fell overnight.

Of course I know that storms and weather systems can shift at the last minute, but really? They didn’t see 2-5 inches coming until half an hour before it fell? They weren’t even calling for rain or sleet or anything wet and then – boom! – there it was. Snow all over our driveway and ground and me having to wake up a teenager who stayed up all night and tell him that his dad has to go to pick up things for a fundraiser for a community organization he’s part of so now said groggy teenager needs to wake up and shovel the driveway.

I’ll also have to go out in this snow later to return my dad’s car to him. He switched his car for his truck, which we have been borrowing because The Husband’s truck has been in the shop for two weeks getting a lot of very expensive work done on it. Dad needed his truck to take recycling downtown. Had I known this earlier than five minutes before he headed our way, I could have driven the truck to him and he could have brought me back home after we delivered the recycling. Dad seems to be like the forecasters these days with his last minute announcements.

Our car isn’t in very good shape either after hitting a deer in late October. The front headlight was damaged and the insurance didn’t want to pay for it but finally did and we ordered a replacement headlight assembly but it came broken so we had to ship it back and now we have to order a new one so my dad and son can replace it and hopefully save us another mechanic’s bill. We will see how that goes.

A drying rack is sitting on the landing at the top of my stairs right now because our dryer finally died and our neighbor offered us the drying rack until we get it fixed. Between working two jobs The Husband has been taking the wet laundry to the laundry mat because I’m too much of a wimp to lift a laundry basket full of wet laundry and carry it to and from the car.

I’ve been thinking a lot these past two weeks about that saying, “When it rains it pours” because it has certainly been raining and pouring here lately, which reminds me that last spring our ceiling leaked and we will probably have to have that looked at again in a couple of months.

Now all of these woes may sound depressing to some of you, but for me, it’s just life because mixed in with the woes have been some good too. A surprise and very appreciated gift of money last week helped us pay off our heating bill last week right before we needed another order (which will mean another bill, but it’s much less this time, thankfully).

My mom has been dealing with severe pain from fibromyalgia for a few weeks now but Thursday I found her CBD stick and we rubbed it on and it actually took the edge off. I’m not done with it yet but I have made quite a bit of progress on the book I am releasing in August as part of a series with a group of other authors.

So there has been some good mixed in with the bad.

Going back to our unexpected snow, I am pretty sure we Pennsylvania residents are no longer surprised when we go to bed with no snow and wake up with two, three, four, or even five inches of it all over the trees and ground and our cars. Throwing open the curtains is literally like opening a mystery box because you just never know what you are going to get. I can tell you that life is never dull in a state where the weather might be sunny and warm enough to wear short sleeves one day and cold, snowy, and wet, requiring winter coats, gloves, and hats the next.

Even my cats are anxious these days about going outside. They no longer dart out onto the back porch ready to start their exploring for the day. Instead they timidly stand in the doorway and move their heads back and forth while their eyes scan the outside world to see what elements they might have to deal with that day and whether or not they want to deal with the elements they see.

Some mornings they simply swish a tail and turn themselves right back around to head back into the house. They find a spot on a chair or a bed to curl up in and sleep the day away, hoping when they wake up it will be sunny and pleasant again and they can lay on their backs and let the sun warm their bellies.

Looking at the weather forecast for the next week, I don’t think that is going to be happening for a while so they might as well take their 18th nap of the day.

It’s probably safer inside anyhow.

No foxes to climb up poles and fences and eat them inside.

How was your week? Let me know in the comments.

Saturday Afternoon Chat: foot injuries, warm and sunny days, friendly cats

/ Lisa R. Howeler / 9 Comments

The wood stove is cold today because we have been given the gift of a short warm-up. Today it is going to be up to 55 degrees. We have been enjoying sun and warmth for the most part, but today it will be cloudy with a chance of rain.

Why did I bring you our local weather report? I have no idea. It’s just something I seem to do on our Saturday chats.

Can I make you some tea or coffee? Maybe some juice or water?

I’m drinking my peppermint tea today and loaded it up with local honey. For some reason, I’m often stingy on the honey. I don’t know if that is because I have a scarcity mindset at times, or what, but this morning I loaded that honey up. I have a huge, two-pound jar of it so it will last me a while.

I might as well get the full effect of that lovely sweet flavor.

Last night at 10 at night it was 44 degrees which was so welcome when most nights it is 32 or below at 10 p.m. at night. It was strange not to have the fire roaring in the woodstove or be huddled under blankets. It almost makes me think we might have the early spring that little rodent said we’d have after all. Of course, the temperature is supposed to plummet again on Monday.

Despite it not being super cold even this morning, I am sitting in bed under two fluffy blankets as I write this and I have disturbed our cat Scout who was napping in the middle of the bed before I set up here. I’d feel bad but this cat sleeps undisturbed quite a bit so I’m sure she will simply find another place to lay and fall back asleep again. She and her nemesis, our other cat, Pixel, have been outside almost all day for the last few days to soak up the warmth.

I was thinking the other day how sweet it is when Scout sees me after I haven’t seen her for much of the day and lets out a little excited trill of a meow and then runs toward me. Usually, she’ll do this if she is in the yard and I open the back door to check on her but the other day she even did it when I was in the kitchen and she came down the stairs in a sleepy fog after one of her morning naps.

“There you are!” I said to her and her eyes widened and she let out her trill and then came trotting toward me. It was the cutest thing. I’ve never had a cat who seemed excited to see me. My cats over the years have been fine with being petted and have even sauntered over and rubbed around my legs for attention, but they never ran toward me like they just loved me like Scout does. It’s a nice feeling and I remind myself of her love for me when she wakes me up at 5 a.m. by laying on my chest and rubbing her cheek against mine for attention. I’d prefer she want that attention not when I am asleep and not when I am in the middle of writing.

Both cats have no respect for my writing time and often choose that time to want to lay on my chest. I do appreciate their affection for me, however. They do not often lie on anyone else in the family other than The Boy. Little Miss moves around too much and The Husband only tolerates the cats because he has shut his heart off to all other cats since he lost his cat Smokey several years ago after he (we) had her for 17 years.

While some weeks I do very little other than running a few errands and homeschooling, this week I was somewhat busy as I spent one day in the emergency room with my dad and the next day in the office of an orthopedic surgeon after he injured his foot last week.

My dad is in a boxing class for physical therapy for Parkinsons. It is an amazing class where they work on cognitive skills, reflexes, and strengthening the things that Parkinson’s tries to steal from its victims. (Here is a site to learn more about it if you know anyone who deals with Parkinson’s. Maybe a similar program is available near them. Dad says that most doctors don’t even suggest physical therapy. He says when they tell a patient they have Parkinson’s they say two things, “Do you want meds?” and “See you in six months.”).

On Thursday morning he attended that class and was kicking a kicking bag but didn’t have any pain. Later that night he was stomping on cans to help them fit inside a container for recycling and it was after that that the pain started but he didn’t think much of it.

By Friday he really couldn’t walk well. By Saturday my ever-busy, always on-the-move Dad was sitting in his recliner with his foot iced, reading my book Gladwynn Grant Takes Center Stage (currently on sale at . . . Just kidding. I shall not slip into a sales pitch).

The discomfort continued through Sunday and by Monday I was on the phone with Dad telling me he thought he should probably go to the emergency room and at least have it x-rayed in case he broke something.

Luckily, he did not break anything.

What he had done was severely bruised the bottom of his foot and caused a condition called plantar fasciitis. It is essentially blood and bruising under the foot muscle. This was confirmed in the ER and then again at an appointment the next day by his orthopedic surgeon, who did his knee surgery several years ago.

I was grateful Dad let me drive him to his appointments because normally my dad pushes through the pain and does things on his own despite it. This time, though, he was concerned about causing more damage to his foot and I was called into action.

At the hospital, while waiting for his x-rays (which they now wheel right into the patient instead of making the patient go to it), there was a man across the hall who had fallen off a ladder and complained that the only reason he was there was that his wife and daughter had made him go to the ER. The man couldn’t even sit on the bed he was in so much pain. It sort of made me giggle because he was fitting the stereotypical opinion that men won’t go to a doctor unless they are dragged there while my dad had decided to go on his own because he was afraid he was going to do more damage.

The ER doctor had suggested still keeping the appointment with the orthopedic doctor, who used to be a surgeon, but now only sees patients for consultations and refers them for surgery or not.

The orthopedic surgeon is a very interesting man and seems to know as much about other medical topics as he does orthopedics. He’s very fascinated with all aspects of medicine and reminded my dad and I to take vitamin C and honey throughout cold and flu season before we left. He has worked in our area for maybe 40 years and used to provide orthopedic services to local athletes as well as support on the sidelines at sports for local school districts.

Dad’s foot woes were not over with the visit with him, however. On Wednesday he noticed blood under the skin on one toe on the injured foot. It was also red. So he called a podiatrist because the orthopedic surgeon was now on vacation and drove himself to that appointment and found out he had an infection in a toe on that foot – possibly unrelated to the injury.

It’s hard for Dad not to be going places and getting things done but he has been resting and taking care of the foot with Epsom salt soaks and his medicine.

Hopefully, he will be up and around later this week.

As for me, I am hoping for a week with a little less running around. Last week I left the house every day except Friday. I know. I know. I have such a tough life. (insert eye roll here). I didn’t end up getting our groceries yesterday like I usually do because Little Miss and The Boy both had friends over and I met the mom of Little Miss’s friend halfway from her house and picked The Boy’s friend up on the way back.

In the afternoon I took all four of them to the tiny playground in our town. The boys ate a couple of subs from the local Subway (yes, this town is tiny but it actually has a Subway in the gas station. And, of course, there is a Dollar General, though it is located about a mile outside town.), chatted, and waited for the little girls to exhaust themselves on the teetertotter and playground equipment.

The rest of the afternoon was spent watching Psych and James May’s show on Amazon.

Today I hope to write a couple other blog posts, work on my novel, and read. Tomorrow we will go visit my parents for lunch.

So that is my week in review –  how about yours?

Do anything exciting or relaxing? Go anywhere interesting? Even if nothing you did was interesting, I’d love to hear about your week in the comments.

(P.S. Scout curled right back up at my feet in a little ball and went back to sleep. Apparently, I didn’t disturb her too much after all.)