Quarry Fishing

 

Yesterday I seen the doctor and now I am considering changing the title of this blog to Pendleton Gal gets Fustrated! The doc tells me my foot might just need time to heal.  Apparently these past couple months of babying my foot have not been long enough.  Surgery was also mentioned.  Auggh.  It's too bad the superglue/felt pad treatment didn't work.  I'm hoping by New Years I will be well on the road to recovery.

 

 

 

 

The above advent calender belongs to Gladys.  Her and Troy each have one.  Behind each window is a little chocolate.  The kids think it's quite the delight.  While I do LOVE chocolate, I am very picky about it.  Good quaility dark chocolate is my favorite cause a little bit goes a long ways. 

 

 

The fly tying plan did actually help me refrain from eating cookies.  Another thing that helps is going to the YMCA.

 

This familiar sight is the weight room at the Y:

Mostly, I have been using the free weights and working on my upper body strength.  However, because I have plans to run again (crossing fingers) soon.  I've been doing some leg strength exercises as well, such as leg extensions.  Usually, I do 3 sets of 12 every other day, increasing the weight a little each week.

 

 

Hopefully by Christmas I will have some noticable results to show.  Speaking of Christmas, the kiddies are so ready for it!  They done have their stockings hung. 

 

 

 

 

Yes!  The high yesterday was really 68 degree here in central Indiana.  Yup, this is just a continuation of the same post and it's the month of December. 

 

 

 I'd say that's a heck of a nice December day!

 

 

Troy's favorite casting spot is the treeless island. 

 

 

 

 

 Our hero, retrieving the tangled line, hook, bobber and sinker, from a tree branch, demonstrates why Troy prefers to cast off the island.  ;)

 

 

Gladys was feeding some hungry fish.

 

 

 

 

Who woulda thought December would have a t-shirt wearing, bluegill catching day like this right here in Indiana! 

Home Tours & Museum

 

The town of Pendleton is fortunate to have an abundance of beautiful historic houses.  This past weekend some of the residents decided to grace the public by offering tours of their homes.   

 

 

 

 

Elegant antique paintings and beautiful stained glass windows were some of the highlights.

 

 

 

 

The kids thought the attic in this house was primo!

 

My favorite part of the historic houses was the elaborate woodwork.

 

 

 

Pretty living spaces are inspirational to me.  All this stained glass has me recalling those church window candies Grandma used to make.

 

 

 

 

Some of the homes had a more trendy decor.  Gladys particularly liked her friend Maggie's bedroom.

 

 

 

 

All the homes were very festive.  Looking at all the Christmas decorations set everyone in a very cheery mood.

 

 

 

 

Besides the different styles of decor, the featured homes were also from various eras ranging from the mid to late 1800's to a 1950's home pictured below.  The cool thing about this home is it had several, still operational, motorized features like this mechanical kitchen window and awning.

The Historical Museum was also part of the day's activities.  Below, is the World's first motorized bike!  My kiddies were getting wore out.  Can ya tell by those faces?

This torture contraption I found comically interesting.  It's an electric hair curler.  Oh girls-- we have it so easy these days!  Lol.

 

 

These vivid dishes are so pretty:

 

 

 

Well, I hope ya'all had some fun this weekend as well.  That's all I got, goodbye for now, till next time.   :) 

A December Swim in Fall's Creek

Hello! We are had a very Christmasy weekend!

 

 

 

 

Us girls did some present wrapping with the ladies at the local library.

 

 

 

Then SANTA appeared for a visit! 

 

 

 

 

Santa brought jingle bells with him natch, and he let Troy jingle them.  Troy shook those bells and put on a dance for the crowd!

 

 

 

After the dance Troy was good and warmed up-- ready to sit on Santa's lap!  Those two chatted for a bit, and Troy let Santa check out his walkie talkie.  Then Santa read the group a story.

 

 

 

During the story, the kids were called up one by one to enhance it with balloon characters.  Gladys was a snowman.  Troy decided to chill and watch the show; he opted out of this act as he already had his moment of fame.

 

 

The story was The Night Before Christmas and here are the enhancers:

 

 

 

That reindeer with those eyes just cracks me up.  As does the Santa legs sticking out of the chimney.

 

Jean was in a photo snapping mood, and took this shot of me looking after Gladdie's snowman.

 

 

We also went to the park.  The ducks and geese greeted us as usual.

 

 

The weather was mild for December. 





I collected feathers for the fly tying. 





Mostly, we just relaxed and watched the kids play.

 

 

That is until Glenn decided to toss crippled me off a cliff and into the water.  I wasn't going in without him though.  Lucky me, I had photo bug, Jean, to capture the escapade.  On second thought, it was a bit to cold for a swim.  :)

Our New House Guest & Sugar Cookies

 

Ohh yeah, time to start the good ole advent calenders!!  Woot woot, it's December first ya'all!  :)

 

 

 

 

This is my favorite advent calender because I have had it as long as I can remember.  If I had to guess, I'd say I got it in 1976.  I remember from back then, my sisters telling me to let them open the window because I would rip it, and that I could ONLY open ONE a day. And OF COURSE I remember waiting extremely impatiently for the ever so anticipated December 24 day to arrive.  That is the big door on there and I knew there just had to be something really great under there.

 

 

Yesterday evening Troy had basketball evaluations.  The coaches rate the kids on various basketball skills to put together teams. 

 

 

 

 

Troy shoots a couple normal shots and then to every one's surprise, he asks the coaches if they would like to see something really cool.  Naturally they did, so Troy turns around and does a back bend granny shot.  Unfortunately, I was laughing to hard to get a pic.

 

 

Our new house guest arrived last night from the North Pole (aka Target)!  She is staying with us until Christmas.  Her name is Crystal Snow and she is an elf on an assignment from Santa.  She is to report back to Santa every night of how the kids are behaving.

 

 

 

 

Troy thinks she is wonderful now.  At first, when I told him about her, he was scared.  He had this idea that some elves are mean.  He thought perhaps we could have a mean elf living with us, and that bothered him.  Now, he is taken by her magic and awwed with thoughts of a creature being so attentive to him.  In other words, Troy is totally cracking me up, because unlike Gladdie, he believes every word of the Elf on the Shelf book is true.

 

Gladys has questions: If I go along with this, will I get more gifts?  Does she have a hidden camera in her head?  

 

Kids are fun, aren't they?

 

 

 

Some of the folk's from our little town of Pendleton invited us to partake in a cookie exchange.  Therefore, we must bake cookies.  Here is a very easy and traditional cookie recipe that has been in my family for at least four generations now:

 

The recipe is in my Grandma Miller's handwriting.  I make these cookies at least once a year.  A mixer is not needed.  Simply mix all the ingredients together.

 

 

Gladys was the designated baker.

 

 

 

She pretty much did everything herself while I kept her entertained taking pictures.  :)

 

 

 

 

These are ready for the oven:

 

 

After they finished baking and had cooled, the kiddies did the funnest part of all--

 

 

 

 

Decorating!!

 

 

 

 

 

Baking cookies and NOT eating them can be challenging. It helps to know that these cookies are destined to go to others. However, because they are just soo freekin delicious, I had a plan in place. The other half of the table is.... fly tying--- YAY! 

 

 

Yes folks, I done dug out my fly tying kit. Fixing to see if I still remember how it's done.

 

 

 

You see, the bonus is-- I cannot eat and tie flys.  For one thing, I'm not all that skilled in tying yet. For another, the feathers and fur make cookie eating rather unappetizing.  Here's hoping the plan works!  :) 

 

 Have a good evening everyone!

 

 

The Man of My Dreams

 

Ahh, relaxing and resting my foot while watching Amazing Race with Dustball, Sophie and Scooby-Doo (Sophie's pretend baby).  Ok, maybe the pets are not all that into the show; they are nice cuddlers anyway.  How nice is it to be snuggled under a blanket and surrounded by the glow of Christmas lights?  :)

 

 

 

And the man of my dreams:

 I was secretly scared of this guy for most of my childhood.  I can recall standing in line to see him and hearing shrieks of torture coming from other kids along with a jolly ole laugh!  Good times!

I finished up a few projects I had been working on.  Do ya'all remember the mitten set and headband?  Well, I made a matching scarf to complete the trio.

 

 

 

 

Sorry about the poor quality of these pics.  The cold weather fogged the camera lens a bit.

 

 

 

It's getting to be that time to bundle up.

 

 

 

Another recently completed project is the Tweety pillow. 

 

 

 

 

Now, maybe Winne won't feel so lonesome.

 

 

 

 

Finally, the last of the completed projects which I made while up north for Thanksgiving, this pretty doily:

 

Time to start something new projects!  Ever since I've moved here I've been wanting to do some fly tying, but my supplies had been packed away.  Digging out the fly tying supplies is coming up next.  :)