A Visit to Syracuse

Cal called my parents this week to see if it was ok if he stayed with them for a few days.  With the holidays coming up and busy season to follow, he wanted to take advantage of the limited free time that he had to see them.  Cal arrived in Syracuse Thursday night in time for a late dinner.  He worked from home during the day yesterday, took a long walk, played Jeopardy with Grandpa and shared several meals with them.  He had hoped to play golf, but the weather didn't cooperate.  He even got to visit with Cameron as before he left for Chicago today.

I was very happy to hear that Cal had been able to come up with a time to visit Grandma and Grandpa.  I know that he is really busy and that once we moved it would be more challenging for him to do so.  I know that my parents really appreciated the time with him as well. 

 

"I'm Gonna Make This Place Your Home"

I thought a lot about the Phillip Phillips song "Home" this past month as I have spent a lot of time turning our Florida house into our new home.  It's been challenging at times.  We had lived in our home in Syracuse for twenty-five years, so I didn't expect it to happen over night.  This week, however, we made huge progress in making my goal a reality.

I realized after finishing Cameron's room a few days ago that it was never going to feel like home if we didn't get our family's pictures on the walls.  I had so many wonderful framed photos waiting to fill those empty spaces, but needed some help from Doug to make it happen.  The project was a lot more tedious than I thought that it would be, but we wanted it to look nice when it was done.  Thankfully, the movers had given us some tips in August that really helped.  They suggested "monkey hooks" for our type of walls instead of nails.  That really did make it easier.  In the end, I was thrilled with how everything looked.  Seeing our family's portraits on the wall really did make it feel like home.

Wedding Plans

Meg and I have talked a lot about her wedding plans and have actually gotten quite a bit done on her list.  They have the caterer, the photographer, the church and the venue lined up.  Their next item will be to work on completing the Catholic church requirements for marriage.  Recently, I was in charge of reserving hotel rooms.  It was actually more time consuming than I thought that it would be, but thankfully I was able to finish that last week as well.

Meg has moved on to some of the more fun wedding planning now - the dress, the colors, and the flowers.  Today, we were talking about toppers for the cake.  I had had the traditional bride and groom statues at my wedding reception in DeKalb, but the ones that we used in Syracuse were a lot more fun.  Meg had seen my wedding bears this summer and loved them.  She talked about borrowing them for her cake, but then found the perfect topper on Etsy.  It wasn't a pair of bears, but another animal that Nick absolutely loved.  I can't wait to see it on her cake.

The Goats

Today on my social media memory, a photo popped up that made me smile.  It was a picture of Cal and his friends at his junior year talent show.  They called themselves "The Goats" and planned to sing "Just a Friend" by Biz Markie.  As soon as I saw the picture, I remembered laughing when they first walked out in their jean short, shorts, a direct violation of the dress code that they had been criticized for earlier in the year.  

All along Cal had planned on the group singing his favorite song, but he was the only one who already had it memorized.  Thus, they decided to perform it as a dramatic reading instead.  It was a crowd favorite from the first line and I enjoyed watching the performance very much.  I loved that Cal and his friends always walked to their own beat then and still do now.  It was a fun reminder of that today and a nice walk down memory lane.

Decorating for Halloween

I definitely downsized a lot of my Halloween decorations last fall, so it didn't take me long to decorate this year.  Even though there was less, I thought that everything looked fall festive in our new home.  I even added some pumpkins to on our front porch.  The gourds were a little bit more challenging to find, but thankfully a pumpkin stand popped up near a church by our subdivision which helped make our home feel a lot more like fall.  

My little light up ghost didn't quite compare to the outside decorations in our neighborhood, but I didn't mind.  I was just happy to have something to add.  Maybe I'll add more to our exterior next year, but for now I will just enjoy looking at all of the Halloween decor in our neighborhood on my daily walks.  

Finally, Time to Read

One of my favorite activities has already been reading.   I can't remember a time when I didn't have a book in my hand.  Some novels have been read over and over, like Pride & Prejudice and Little Women, while others have been a one time read such as The DaVinci Code.  No matter the story, I just haven't had a lot of time to read these past two years.  Getting the Syracuse house ready to sell and unpacking the Florida home have left me with little time to do anything else.  I promised myself that once October began, I would schedule more time for reading.  

The first book that I finished after the move was from one of Cameron's favorite series, The Sixty-Eight Rooms.  He had talked about getting rid of the books at the garage sale, but I wanted to read at least one of them first.  It was a fun mystery series based on the Thorne Rooms in the Chicago Art Museum.  I enjoyed reading the first book in the series, but decided that I would move on to something else next.  I just wasn't sure what.

After listening to Father Mike explain the book of Ruth in his "Bible in a Year Podcast" I remembered one of the best series that I had ever read.  The books were written by Francine Rivers and followed the five women in the lineage of Christ with Ruth being one of them.  I started looking for them on Barnes & Noble and realized that they had been combined into one collection entitled "The Lineage of Grace."  

As I was searching for the best place to order the collection, I found a resale book shop on Ebay that offered a"Buy Three, Get the Fourth One Free" promotion.  I knew that I not only wanted a new book for me, but needed to order a new copy of Winnie the Pooh as well.  The one that I had found when unpacking Cameron's room was missing several pages.  Since I already needed two books, I decided to look for two more.  

I messaged Jim right away to get his thoughts.  He was always reading something and loved books from the 1800s as much as I did.  I knew that Enchanted April was his favorite, but wondered if he had any other suggestions.  As soon I messaged, I heard back from him instantly.  He had several recommendations for me, all that were on the Ebay bookstore.  I was thrilled when my three "new" books arrived in the mail today along with a identical copy of our 1960s Winnie the Pooh.  I can't wait to get reading.

My Brother's Birthday

Today would have been my brother's 60th birthday.  It sounded old when I said it, but since I am turning 55 next month, it doesn't feel that old.  My mom started the day with her favorite pictures of Bunk on Facebook which I enjoyed.  I had seen all of them many times before, but always liked thinking about a simpler, easier time when he was still part of our family's daily dynamics.

As I looked through the pictures this year, I noticed that there were some of him alone and others with my cousin Billy.  Being the youngest, I decided to make sure that everyone realized that I was left out of the celebration and searched through my camera roll for pictures of Bunk with "his favorite sister."  I laughed when I made the post and hoped that my mom would realize that I was just joking around.  It didn't matter to me if Bunk was still with us or not.  He was my brother and there was no way that I was letting him upstage me, even if it was his birthday.  Thankfully, my mom got the joke and found even more pictures to post.  Soon there were dozens of photos of me smiling with my brother while he wore his famous frown.  It was a great way to remember a big brother that I absolutely adored, even though I was probably the reason for the scowl on his face.