A Hundred & One!!!

Every time I read or hear "a hundred & one" I hear the theme from Walt Disney's 101 Dalmations in my head   : )

Over the past couple weeks I've noticed my number of followers increasing!  I don't know where you are all coming from but I'm glad to have you   : )   Needless to say I am glad to have all my followers!  I appreciate every one of you!  My 6-month blogoversary will be here in just a few days.  I started blogging on May 1st & since that day I have met many nice people, learned quite a few interesting things, & made some really good friends in the process!  Life is good   : )

I have been doing a bit of decorating here & there ... something I wasn't sure I was going to do this year but I finally decided to go for it   : )   I got adventurous & dug into the cupboard underneath the stairs.

   

Now I know what you're thinking ... what an amazingly neat & organized cupboard!  Well, keep in mind that you are seeing this cupboard after I took many boxes out & put things away that I had just tossed in there throughout the past year.  This cupboard, of course, goes way back ... all the way underneath the stairs as these cupboards are apt to do.  There are boxes & boxes of Christmas things ... some which haven't seen the light of day since we moved here 2-1/2 years ago & some even before that!  Here is where the adventurous part comes in.  I decided to open some of the sealed moving boxes in there to see what I might find.  I didn't realize I had all this stuff!  I mean, I knew there was a lot of stuff but didn't exactly remember what all the stuff was!  I didn't empty the boxes ... just kind of peeked around a bit & thought how much fun it will be one day to actually unpack these things & see what's in there!

I will try to take photos later today of the little bit of decorating I have done.  I haven't put the tree up yet.  Last year I decided I wanted a skinny prim tree with prim ornaments on it & that is what I'll put up again this year.  

Speaking of trees, the little blue spruce in the front yard looks wonderful with the old-fashioned colored lights on it.  However, I did run into a bit of a snag after buying the extension cord for the extension cord.  I went outside, added the new cord & plugged it into one of the two porch outlets.  Nothing happened.  There is a light switch inside near the front door that doesn't do anything inside so I always assumed it turned these porch outlets off & on.  How convenient!  I can light & unlight the tree in the warmth of my home just by flicking a switch!  Unfortunately flicking the switch did absolutely nothing.  I figured perhaps that one outlet was "bad" so I tried the other one.  Had to reposition the whole 90 feet of extension cord to get to it.  You can guess what I'm going to say next, right?  That outlet also doesn't work.  Now ... we had an inspector check this house before we bought it & it appeared that he was beyond thorough, even making mention of the fact that a light bulb was burned out here or there, but apparently he never bothered to check the porch outlets.  Thankfully there is another outside outlet by the garage & that one does work.  Had to reposition the cord again & wondered how in the world I was going to walk out in yard in all kinds of weather to plug it in & unplug it all the time.  Then I remembered I had bought a timer when we were living in Michigan!  God bless the person or persons who invented these timers!  The tree now lights all by itself at 5 p.m., shuts off at midnight, then comes on again at 5 a.m. & shuts off at 7:30 a.m.  It's nice to see it out there   : )

In addition to the above I have been cross stitching as much as time will allow me.  I have finished stitching a few more ornaments but still need to actually make them into ornaments.  I plan to have a "finishing day" sometime this week in order to do that.  My antique treadle needs servicing & there is no one around these parts to do it so I will have to try to find someone in a nearby big town who can hopefully do that.  When we lived in North Dakota there was a sweet old man who owned a sewing store & he would come to my house & service it for me ... sometimes for free because he was so impressed that I enjoyed sewing on it rather than wanting a fancy-schmancy computerized machine.  I  miss that man!  Anyway, I had to close up the treadle & get the little portable I bought to finish off my cross stitch fabric edges a couple weeks ago out of the box & I will be using that to stitch together my ornaments.  I have the portable sitting on top of the treadle cabinet.  I hope I'm not causing the treadle to feel unloved.  I will post photos of the ornaments when I finish them   : )   I have, in fact, quite a few photos to share with you in the coming days.  If all goes as planned, I will do exactly that   : )