Sunny Black Friday

Happy Day After Thanksgiving! I hope you had a good Thanksgiving and got to spend time with family and/or friends. We 3 along with Maw and Porge had an enjoyable dinner at Gram and GrandDad's house. Gram made a fabulous dinner with all the extras. While at their house, I got to talk to my brothers, Bob and Jim and their families. All is well with them.

Thanksgiving morning we all went our separate ways to get some exercise. Jim ran in a

10K race in the freezing rain and Arctic winds and won his age group so he brought home $75! Corey went for a run a little later when the rain had turned to snow and I wimped out and ran and rowed on the machines at the gym! We all got home about the same time and raked some leaves into piles as the snow was falling.

One of our conversations at dinner was about some friends of Gram and GrandDad's, whose

Thanksgiving dinner was "local," meaning everything came from within 50 miles of their

home. Jim thought this sounded interesting and 

we began brainstorming what we would

be able to eat if we went with this 50 mile challenge for our Christmas dinner. Apples, potatoes, and hydroponic lettuces were the easy foods, but the main course was a bit more challenging. There were suggestions for squirrel and woodchuck! A visit to the Public Market will probably fill our needs and Jim and I will take a run down there in the next couple of weeks to see what kind of local meat

we can find. Jim did a quick internet search and came up with some farms within our 50

mile limit that raise chicken, turkey, pigs,

and cows for meat sales. So, I think this is something that we can manage! A note to the Kuehls-you have been warned-re-read the above paragraph before you RSVP for

Christmas dinner!

I went to the mall this morning, at 8:30, and was amazed by the lines in some of the stores. I talked with one friend who waited in line in Bon-Ton for 1 hour and 20 minutes to pay for her stuff! No way! I saw those lines and walked right through the store. I did buy a few things, but never had to wait in a long line.

Jim and I walked to City Mattress (about 1/2 mile down Ridge Road, definitely the fastest way to get there today!) and bought a new mattress. There were no lines at City Mattress, as a matter of fact, we were the only customers there most of the time. We tried out 4 different mattresses and decided to go with a Simmons Beauty Rest of some type. It has some kind of plush top and because each spring (coil) is individually wrapped, I shouldn't feel it when Jim is rolling around! The mattress will be delivered next Thursday, which will give me time to purchase new sheets! Jim said that mattress shopping was probably the kind of shopping he enjoys the most, lots of laying around! 

Hope all is well.

Happy Thanksgiving

I wish each and every Empty Nest reader a Happy Thanksgiving.

I started to write a list of things for which I am thankful and it became very long and I was worried that I would leave something off that was important to me so I will keep the list in my head and heart and continue to mentally add to it. Be sure to know that my loving family and friends are at the top of my list.

Enjoy this day of Thanksgiving and take a moment to count your blessings.

Today's photo is from the archives, specifically April 2004, Colorado Springs, CO. Just one more pretty photo.

Hope all is well.

Short Work Week!

Corey is home! Yea! He got a ride as far as Eastview Mall and we picked him up there shortly after 7 PM. He was home for about 15 minutes when he was into a bag of chips and was out to see his friends in under 2 hours!! He visited both sets of grandparents, had dinner with us and will now go out with his high school friends for the evening! 

So the Dancing With the Stars finals will be next week and the 3 best couples will not be

there. The 3 most popular couples will dance, as once again Marie managed to get enough votes to stay. I nearly turned off the TV when she and her partner were the first names called to be in the finals! I'm glad I stayed tuned because Michael Flatley's dance was amazing! I loved the precision of it! So I will watch next week's Dancing Finals, to see the great dancing, but I cannot cheer for Marie.

Funny school story: The children did a jump rope warm-up today and the kindergartners are just beginning to get how to jump rope. One very hyper, ADD-type 4 year old boy (just made the Kindergarten age cut-off, should have had a year of Pre-school) was wanting me to watch him as he started running and jumping rope down the length of the gym. By the time he got to the other end, his too-big pants were down around his ankles and he was all bent over giving us all a nice view of his Superman underwear! He has made good progress as a rope jumper, now I just need to give him my "loaner" belt next time we jump!

I came across this website which analyzes other websites and blogs for their reading level. I typed in the info for The Empty Nest and it got a Junior High Rating.  Corey says that if I want to up my rating I should just cut and paste some pages from a dictionary into my blog! 

It was a cold, dreary day here and the weather is forecasted to be worse tomorrow. Jim is racing in a 10K race at 9:00 AM tomorrow and  the rain should be changing to snow or sleet about then with strong winds out of the north. The first 3 miles of the race head straight north! In the past he has won the Veteran's division and picked up the $75 award! 

Jim and I may go mattress shopping this weekend. Some friends will know that we have been talking about needing a new mattress for years! I  have been trying to prepare Jim for the sticker shock that he may experience when he first walks into City Mattress, but I'm sure he will still not be a happy camper about the price of a decent mattress. We think our mattress is about 18 years old!

We do need to make some headway on the leaves this weekend too, now that Corey is here to help. Hopefully we won't have to shovel first to get to the leaves!

Have a great Turkey Day and go for a walk after your big dinner!

Hope all is well.

Mundane Monday

I'll jot  a quick entry before Dancing with the Stars starts. Is this the week that Marie Osmond goes home? I hope so. The other couples are so much better than she is-I think she has survived on the sympathy vote.

Jim had a good race yesterday and came home with a couple of awards. 

I rang bells during the worship service at church and the piece went well. My part was very challenging and I was pleased with how I rang.

Did any of you see the crushing of the Buffalo Bills by the Patriots last night? There was so much hope in western New York that Bills could pull off the upset of the century, but the realists knew better. 

I went to the fastest PTA meeting at school tonight-35 minutes! I had time to make a trip to the library before coming home.

Jim is spending the night as a volunteer at a men's homeless shelter tonight. He does this about once every 2 months during the cold weather.

Corey called tonight to say that he wasn't leaving Syracuse until 9 PM tomorrow because the guy he is riding with has a class until then. We will pick Corey up at Eastview Mall about 10 PM and we will be glad to have him home for a few days.

Here's a funny school story. Today during one of our games with first graders, every time this one girl bent over, all this fabric would pull out of her pants and she would stand up and try to push it back down her pants. When I asked her if everything was OK she said that when she got dressed this morning she forgot to take off her pajama bottoms and they kept "popping" out of her pants! You gotta love these kids!

Hope all is well.