Wonder Dog and Wonder Wallet

I've been thinking we should buy a paper shredder, but after seeing the fine work done last evening by Molly, our chocolate Lab, I realize we already have a paper shredder "in house." She does meticulous work, as you can see by the remains of this catalog. I'd like to say she's much less expensive than a real paper shredder, but alas, that's simply not true.

Molly also shreds stuffed animals, even brand new ones still fresh from the store.

I'd love to have a kitten, but I shudder to think what Molly would do with it.

Now for a completely different topic: The amazing, incredible, awesome Wonder Wallet.

I've been making these for the past couple of months, after they were suggested as a fundraiser for my teachers'/retired teachers' organization. I wish I'd kept count of the number I've sold so far, but I'd guess it's around 45.

A friend gives me her outdated fabric sample books (She's an interior decorator), and I select coordinating fabrics for each little wallet. They're quite fun to make, although the cutting-out of fabrics gets a little tedious.

I took twenty Wonder Wallets to a tri-state A∆K meeting a couple of weekends ago, and they sold out within 30 minutes. A few ladies even prepaid for me to mail additional wallets to them once I got back home.

My only expenses are fusible interfacing and Velcro. For a mere $5, the purchaser has a handy little travel wallet to hold credit cards, some cash and a few coins. Clever invention, I say.

Removing Traces

I've just finished reading Anne Morrow Lindbergh's Hour of Gold, Hour of Lead. This memoir, containing Anne Lindbergh's diary entries and letters from 1929 to 1932, gives a glimpse into the joys and deep sorrow of her life. Her marriage to Charles Lindbergh, their flights together (including a fascinating around-the-world voyage), the birth of their first child, Charles, are overshadowed by the tragic kidnapping and murder of their little boy. Anne's grief is powerful and all-encompassing, even as she awaits the birth of her second son, Jon, and even as she is joyful at this second birth.

While Anne Lindbergh's grief stays with me, it is one particular passage, dealing with another topic, that especially caught my interest and surprised me. It surprised me because I'd just recently read a similar sentiment in someone else's blog, and it is a sentiment I'd never really thought about before.

Anne's sister, Elisabeth, has just left the Lindberghs' home after a visit, and the maid is cleaning the guest room where Elisabeth stayed. Anne says, "Mary rushed to clean up [the room] and run the vacuum cleaner over the rugs. How I hate that still, closed-eyes look of a room when the person has left. It should not be cleaned up so quickly, as though it could forget the person, as though it could turn, from a living companion, into just 'room,' 'master's bedroom,' so quickly.

In Caryn's blog, she says, after waving goodbye to her son who has just paid a visit, "What am I doing? Why, when I miss the children so when they leave us, do I hurry to remove all traces of their being here? Why not leave those sheets on the bed a while longer so I can continue to inhale and take in the whisper of fragrance he left behind?"

I'm not suggesting plagiarism here! What I am doing is continuing to think about this habit we have of cleaning up a bedroom after a guest has left. I'm guilty of rushing to remove the sheets and replace them with clean ones, of tidying up the room to leave no traces of the recent guest. But why? 

I think, in my case, it helps to ease the pain of having a loved one leave. I've always had a difficult time with goodbyes, embarrassing myself and probably my husband with a flood of tears that I can't seem to harness. Often I'm crying still as I clean the bedroom, removing traces of a treasured visitor. I remember feeling so sad and empty when nieces and nephews, my mother, friends would go home after visiting us. Getting the room cleaned helped me get my emotions under control and get on with my life. But maybe next time someone special visits, I'll leave the guest room as is for awhile after their visit.

Mountains and Lake

Yesterday I decided to go to North Conway, NH, for some Christmas shopping. I couldn't have chosen a prettier day, unless I'd chosen a day when the leaves weren't a tad past their peak. 

Nonetheless, the views of the White Mountains (Mount Washington in particular) were spectacular.

On the way home I decided to drive to Bridgton, ME to check out Reny's and do a little more shopping there, then go to Sebago in order to visit Korner Knitters Yarn Shop, which is having its October sale.

Here, in reverser order of my journey, are some photos of the day. First, a shot of Sebago Lake.

Next, Route 107 from Bridgton to Sebago.

The view as I drove in to North Conway, NH

The view toward the foothills of the White Mountains.

There she is in the distance: Mount Washington.

It was a great day to be enjoying the beauty of New Hampshire and Maine.

Nothing Important

It's a drizzly day with the leaves falling rapidly from the trees. I don't enjoy this time of year once the leaves have fallen. I find it depressing with the landscape so stark. But there's the first snowfall of the season to look forward to, and that's always exciting because the landscape is once again beautiful. The first snowfall won't arrive for at least a month, though....

Molly and I set out for our morning walk awhile ago, then it promptly started to rain more heavily. We endured the rain briefly then headed back home. Undaunted, we'll try again later.

Tomorrow is the big Lobster Box Lunch fundraiser for my organization, Alpha Delta Kappa. We sell over 400 lunches, which consist of a lobster roll, chips, pickles, and homemade brownies. All of this for a mere $8. Not a bad deal. We'll meet at a member's home at 6:00 a.m. and frantically assemble the lobster rolls and pack the boxes. I'm glad we do this only once a year, because it's a lot of work. It's a good fundraiser, though; we use the money for scholarships, donations to needy causes, and to sponsor a family in need at Christmas. My two big batches of brownies are cooling on the kitchen counter. Our chapter of A∆K has been selling lobster box lunches for so many years that we have the entire procedure right down to a science: who buys the fresh lobster, who buys the buns, who buys the pickles, etc. We're a well-oiled machine.

When I was at Briggs & Little yarn shop in Harvey, NB last week, I took a chance and bought 8 hanks of yarn from their "Odds and Ends" bin. The hanks were $2 each, for a worsted weight 100% wool, 270 yds. per hank. I wasn't sure what to expect, but I've wound all of the hanks into skeins and am pleased that the yarn is all of excellent quality. The sales clerk said they might be in the Odds and Ends bin because their dye lot is slightly "off," and I suspect that's exactly the case with my bargains. Anyway, I'm knitting myself a sweater with the yarn; not a bad deal since the sweater will require about six skeins of the yarn, totaling $12. I do love a good bargain. I'm not a Yankee AND Scottish for nuthin'. 

As you've deduced by now, I have nothing to write about, but I wanted to update my post.

Yarn & Foliage

We took a different route from Fredericton, NB, to the Maine border last Tuesday so we could stop at the Briggs & Little Woolen Mill, Ltd., in Harvey, NB. Briggs & Little is Canada's oldest woolen mill, and I was dying to check it out.

I wasn't disappointed.

Here you see  the yarn I bought: enough for two adult sweaters and two pairs of adult socks. I also picked up a free pattern for a knitted hat, or "toque," so I whipped one up this weekend from some other yarn I had on hand. I finished it this afternoon and am pleased with the pattern. (I seem to like blue, don't I?)

Now that I'm back home, I wish I'd bought more yarn while at Briggs & Little. There was some yellow that kept calling to me, but I resisted. Why, oh why, did I resist? I see another trip to New Brunswick in my near future.

This is the view from our living room this weekend. It's probably the last weekend of brilliant foliage, so I decided to share this photo even though there's a messy pile of Sunday paper sections (mainly advertisements, I might add), in the chair on the left.

Ken's outside using his new riding lawn mower with the new leaf-picker-upper hitched to the back, cleaning fallen oak leaves from the lawns. Since there are still plenty of leaves attached to the trees, though, I suspect he just wanted an excuse to be outside riding around on his new toy.

A Little Fear and a Little Humor

Last weekend on our drive back home from Moosehead Lake, we were doing maybe 65-70 while passing another car. I happened to look over at the driver of the other car as we passed her, and I wished I hadn't. I thought seeing a person on a cellphone while barreling down the highway was sufficiently scary.

This driver, though, had that beat: She was applying mascara while doing a cool 60 mph. Yep. She had the windshield visor down, in order to use its mirror, and she was carefully applying mascara to her lashes. I've applied enough mascara of my own to know that it can't be done without studying one's eyelashes carefully in the mirror. This means, of course, she was not looking at the road.

Probably she was talking on her cellphone, too. I didn't notice.

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BUT, I have a funny story for you too, sort of to offset the scary one.

Our friends at Moosehead, during dinner, started telling us stories of the goings-on in their old neighborhood. This one is priceless:

It was Halloween night, and neighbors of theirs (a husband and wife) were experiencing that lull between the arrival of the little trick or treaters and the big trick or treaters. The wife decided to play a trick on her husband. She went into the bathroom, removed all of her clothes, put on a long coat, slipped pantyhose over her head, and sneaked out the back door. She ran around to the front door and rang the doorbell. Her husband opened the door. She yelled "Trick or Treat!?" and threw open her coat.

He fainted, struck his head on the newel post on the way to the floor, and she had to call the rescue unit. End of story.

Our Trip to Bountiful

Have you ever seen the 1985 movie The Trip to Bountiful, with Geraldine Page and Rebecca DeMornay? It's the story of an elderly lady who wants nothing more than to get back to her home town, and happier times, before she dies. A young woman, portrayed by DeMornay, meets the elderly lady on the bus and learns of her wish to return to Bountiful. The young woman helps her reach her destination.

I first saw this movie many years ago and sobbed like a baby towards its end. It reminded me of the annual pilgrimage my mother and I made to her hometown of Burtts Corner, New Brunswick, as soon as school closed each June and I was out of "captivity" and free to take a road trip. My mother and I went to NB for many years, driving for seven hours to see the old family farm, visit the cemetery where so many of her family, including her parents, are buried, and stay with Uncle Harry and Aunt Jean. Sometimes we took others along on the journey, but more often we went alone.

I consider those trips with my mother some of the most precious times I spent with her. We did a lot of talking and laughing during those long drives. And a visit with Uncle Harry and Aunt Jean was always the best part of the trip.

My mother is gone now, as are Uncle Harry and Aunt Jean, but I discovered during the past two days that it's still possible to take a trip to "Bountiful." This time the trip was with my older sister, Shirley, and her daughter, Cheryl. They hadn't been back to Burtts Corner and Dorn Ridge, New Brunswick, for at least 30 years, and it was fun to be a part of their return.

We had beautiful weather for the drive, as you can see from these photos. The sky was filled with clouds that seemed to be hanging there just to show off their beauty. The fall foliage was at its peak, and the air was crisp. 

We visited the too-few remaining relatives in Burtts Corner, went on to Dorn Ridge to the cemetery to pay respect to the graves of Grampy, Grammy, Uncle Harry, Aunt Jean, and others, drove up to the potato farm my grandparents lived on for more than fifty years, and reminisced.

It was a perfect Trip to Bountiful, capped off with the three of us sharing a hotel room on the Saint John River near the Mactaquac Dam and talking and laughing into the night.

(The photos, from top to bottom are of Mt. Katahdin, in Maine, as we drove up to Houlton to cross the border into New Brunswick; the first view of the Dorn Ridge Settlement, near the end of a seven-mile dirt road from Burtts Corner; the view from my grandparents' farm; and a glorious golden maple on the Saint John River.)

Enjoying Moosehead Lake

 

On Friday we joined our friends Jim and Lynn for a 3 1/2-hour drive to Greenville, Maine. There we boarded The Katahdin and enjoyed a 3-hour cruise on Moosehead Lake. Moosehead is Maine's largest lake, and it's a beauty. 

The weather didn't cooperate as well as it could have, but still, we enjoyed the boat ride, the playful loons, the spectacular views, the adventure of it all.

The Katahdin was fully restored a few years ago after being left to deteriorate for several decades. In one of the cabins are "planks" acknowledging those who have donated money to the restoration and maintenance of the vessel. I began reading names of donors and was surprised to see so many had the first name of "Imo." I thought, huh, these folks must be Finnish perhaps. Then as I read on, I began seeing planks with "In memory of" preceding various names. Duh. The "Imos" were actually In memory of's. Sometimes I'm not the brightest bulb in the box.

I don't think the fall foliage was quite at its peak, but it was nearly there, and it was beautiful. The weather was crisp; on Saturday morning the temperature was in the low 40's.

After our cruise, we checked out the Moosehead Marine Museum and learned a lot about the history of the lake and the entire Moosehead Region.

Then, another highlight of our trip was dinner with close friends of Jim and Lynn. We had the most delicious lobster casserole EVER, a recipe found in Linda Greenlaw's The Lobster Chronicles. Mercy, it was good. No casserole needs to be THAT good. The lobster casserole, the salad, the rice...all of it was perfect when combined with old friends, humorous stories, and good wine.

We spent the night in Greenville, at a small motel. I loved the sound of the Canadian Pacific, I think, train passing through town at precisely 5:30 a.m. I hadn't heard a train whistle in years.

It was a good weekend for being reminded of why I love Maine so much.

Tooth Fairy Pillows

I decided I needed to update my blog, and I decided something colorful was in order, so here are some tooth fairy pillows I made recently. These are not for Ken and me; they're for three little folks, one of whom will start losing teeth before long. The other two have a while to go before their baby teeth bail out.

I got the instructions here. All you need is some colorful felt, some embroidery floss and an embroidery needle, and a little bit of ability. They're quick to make.

I remember the thrill of finding some coins from the tooth fairy under my pillow after losing a tooth. I remember also the fun of running my tongue over the empty space in my mouth. Those were the good old days.