Hello, it has been a very long time. I have missed you. Time, where did the time go? I realize you have not heard from me going on 9 months. Unrecorded time due to life getting in my way. So much happened at the end of year 2011 and the beginning of 2012. When I was a teenager it was important for me to write nightly.
“Dear Diary today I”. How funny, we make sure at a certain age to document or purge our daily ins and outs. This happens because our daily struggles are possibly more monumental to a young woman at the time and we know not how to deal that we must write it down for comfort. Now just finding a moment in our days makes it impossible, so we carry it within and hope for the best. Some of us find it very satisfying to document daily through out our lives. Such as Diane Keatons Mother who kept journals for life documentation ending her life with 85 journals when she passed. Amazing. Ms. Keaton has put her Mother’s journals in a memoir for all of us to read and treasure drawing from them for her memoirs. A must read I believe. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/27/diane-keaton-writing-memoir_n_1460008.html?ref=books To document me once again, for life should be tracked for the future Family Generations.
August of 2011 might have been more bearable had I purged it from my head for sanity. Many weekends were spent closing the estate of a loved one past. Not without heartache of deceit, betrayal, disrespect, and in the end a payoff just to finalize the close of this estate which had begun to eat into the finances of our household. The frustration of it all seeped into my relationship with the Man and had I not been aware of the reality of the stress he was under it may have brought a huge wedge between us. Realization of the anger he was projecting on me had nothing at all to do with me. I chose to step back, and offer no advice without permission. Sometimes support is all that is wanted. A relationship of the only close surviving relatives in his Family (immediate family members not included) has ended and may never be mended. The needed glue that bound the Family are long gone, his Mother and Father. Apologies are warranted in order to heal. Will’s left without clear cut clarity are and can be damaging to Families, along with attorneys who move forward when all the paper work isn’t in hand to protect the one’s dealing with a loved ones estate. Getting thru the process has left us very aware of the steps we may need to implement so history doesn’t repeat itself. The house was emptied for another Family to flourish and make their own life memories. Rooms are bare with one last item to retrieve hanging in an emptied closet.
The pink Volunteer smock worn proudly by Muriel Casassa. This love of helping kept her going with a feeling of purpose and love from all who knew her. Memories of our loved ones life surrounds The Man and I daily from the furnishings and trinkets collected by the loved ones at rest now. We move forward, and the Man smiles seeing his Mother’s birds adorning our shelves and Sunday mornings are spent filling in the Sudoku's at the oak table his Father refinished. Two are now rekindled and in God’s Hands.
September brought me Joy and reconnection with a long lost sister who timidly and cautiously opened her life up to me once again. Something I have desired for many years. 
Picture of our first reconnection before her visit.I have 2 brothers and 2 sisters and for whatever reason we have been estranged from each other. I know the reasons but time has passed and we are older and wiser now. Labor Day weekend found my younger brother along with one of my sisters and her daughter together for a fun filled weekend on my territory. My quilting sis approached the weekend with trepidation, instead of staying with us she had a room at a near by hotel for escape when the atmosphere became to overwhelming for her. How smart. I can’t blame her for that. Personalities have changed, when and if drama arises she can have a safe haven to go to. I have done the same thing when paying a visit to others I might need to escape from on a long days visit for brain shutdown. I will be referring to her as my Quilting Sis. She has found her passion making quilts. Like me she has many talents. I also celebrated my Granddaughters 4th birthday and created for her one of my best cakes buttercream frosted. A cookout and the Daughters in-laws made for a good time. I did the cleaning, cake baking, Daughter and Son in-law provided the cooking and food. We held the birthday in our home, I was never more happy to do so. Nice time.
October found me busy as busy can be with work, weather was changing and customers are gearing up for winter with coat repairs and weddings aplenty. I was in the midst of learning something new for my trade with the purchase of an embroidery machine. This purchase proved to be not so fruitful as a money maker in the repair and alteration business but it proved to be fruitful in other ways. The embroidery machine brought my sister and I even closer. She helped me learn the ends and outs of said machine, she even invested time and money. First embroidery gig was a hit for my client who continues to come back for more logos to be embroidered.
What a fun long night. Monogramming? I fins people want it until you price it out for them. If you have an opportunity for a garment with free monogramming, jump on it.( I will explain why in the future when I share the process, supplies and time involved.) October gave us a scare of a potential job loss. Employees the Man had the pleasure to work with were being let go with an opportunity for placement with an outsourced company. Didn’t seem at the time it was going to happen to the Man so we continued living as we were living. Buying a wall unit, and a new TV. Sill concentrating on getting debt paid down for the day I could say Adios to the job venture I took on in October 2011. This venture has proven not to be as sold. I lack control, and even with all the improvements made to shop it is still an unbearable work environment, let alone I am constantly working 18 hour days. We fit in fun where ever we can. We celebrated and dressed in costume for Halloween, a holiday which used to be one of my favorites. I would go all out decorating the outside of our house, (well the porch and front door) as scary as the theme for that year in my mind allowed me too. Never the same from year to year. One year little kids were too frightened to approach me handing out candy. I laughed. Probably wasn’t a good idea to be dressed as a witch. The night of the event arrives, reluctantly, because I am old, I donned my costume, (purchased) and helped the Man with his. We were the scariest dressed people at the event. Me, a zombie Prom Queen, (finally a Prom Queen) and the Man a Vampire. 
Had I known many would be dressed as a character from the Wizard of Oz I may have gone as Glenda the Good Witch Zombie. I am laughing at the thought of that. It was befitting for many to be dressed as these characters with the event out in the country, almost boonies with corn fields surrounding. We had a good time all in all for two old farts. Bare with me now, closing in on the end of 2011.
November, still busy I have managed to see Quilting sister several times. She has been so kind to come and straighten out business with the embroidery machine for me. (Software purchased for designing on my laptop.) I need a personal assistant at times. The weekend of November 11th Veterans day would be a Thanksgiving celebration for my loved ones. My #1 Daughter is cooking dinner for us on Thanksgiving, something she would like to do herself for a change. Veterans Day weekend is an opportunity for Soldier Son to come home with a 4 day pass along with his girlfriend and her 3 year old child. Seeing as how someone else would be cooking Thanksgiving and Soldier Son not coming home for the holiday, how perfect. I wouldn’t miss out at all on cooking. I went all out. The day was fun, the eats were as good as ever topping the evening off with cards being played in the kitchen and Xbox Kinect being played in the Family room. Two weeks later I prepared for Daughters Thanksgiving. I had been asked to bring my homemade stuffing and cranberry sauce. The Grandbabies love cranberry sauce. I threw in the dessert making a pumpkin cake that looked like a turkey.
I Hoped the babies would get a kick out of it. They did, and the cake tasted ever so yummy. Pumpkin cake with orange flavored buttercream. Yum! Next time I will create it differently, test run looked pretty good seeing as how I am not a professional. Cali girl has her 26th birthday, I hate it that she is so far away and I can’t spoil her as I would like, with Family celebrating and gifts as if it were her own private holiday. (known for spoiling on my children's birthdays, I just get carried away. The reasons why is a story within itself.) Next best idea, buy her a gift in Cali for her to have straight away where she can pick it up from the store. “Hello. JoAnn Fabrics, I hope you can help me.” I purchased for her the Cricut Expression II an upgrade from what she had. Cali girl was ecstatic. Next year Thanksgivings in Cali would be awesome and then a birthday celebrated with me.
December, oh you wicked December. It happened. The Man lost his job. Final day with a company of 25 years will be done at the end of December. Really isn’t nice to keep an employee on and not allow them to interview with outsource company leading them to believe their job was safe. What now? How long before he can replace it with another? The Man is up there in years and in pay, who is going to hire him???? Because of years with the company a severance pay was handed to him. I have always found it to be cruel when companies let employees go at the holiday months. CRUEL. Now what? Another Christmas without gifts to give. I try to hold onto a quote “Joy is not in THINGS; it is in US.” (Richard Wagner) I didn’t even desire to decorate for the holiday, work load and the Man being jobless was coming down hard on me. Everything we were planning for my future, poof, gone. As far as I could see at the time. The Man asked me one day, “what would you like for Christmas?” Astounded, I replied, “ is that wise you without an income?” He informed me that I work far to hard not to have what I desire. I asked for nothing except the opportunity to give gifts to the children and grandbabies. I really didn’t need a thing for I generally bought what ever I desired and at the time desired nothing but being able to give. In agreement I found the energy to decorate a week before Christmas and planned the gifts to buy, a theme for all. Soldier Son would be home for a month. Everyone except Cali Girl would be present. Moving forward we put the job loss on the shelf for now. 2012 will be a new year with new opportunities. With hopes it would not be for long. 
Theme for gifts. Everyone received a new coat. The decorations were once again in the little time allowed, Cheery and beautiful. Bring on 2012. Let’s see what it holds for us.
Next post: synopsis of 2012. Hope you won’t mind.
