A Journal of Activities

 Hi friends and fellow bloggers,

Just checking in here to see how things are going with you. Since my last post I've been busy trying to get things done. I've also been getting back into reading which is one of my favourite activities.

I finished reading, The Room on Rue Amelie by Kristin Harmel.

 

It is a very touching and poignant book in so many ways. The story line involves an American woman who marries a French man and settles in Paris. Shortly thereafter the Germans occupy the city and her husband becomes involved in the resistance movement unbeknownst to her. When she finds out she wants to help too but her husband vetoes the idea. After his death she does get involved in harbouring members of the Allied forces and helps many get to safety. The rest of the story revolves around her love life and what happens to her as she is sent to concentration camp in Germany. I highly recommend the book. Now I'm reading a few others including another book by Kristen Hormel called, The Winemaker's Wife.

 

In  non-fiction books I've been enjoying a large coffee table book devoted to the late Elizabeth Taylor's jewellery collection and the stories behind the pieces. The other book I will be reading is called The New Bohemians Handbook, a book about the Bohemian style of decorating.  I will have a lot of eye candy to look at as I get ready for Christmas.

Of course this year we will not be able to get together with loved ones or invite others over for dinner. Today (Monday) the Covid 19 restrictions were extended until January and for weeks people have been encouraged to refrain from getting together with those they don't live with due to the very high Covid-19 numbers.  For me this isn't a big change because I've been doing this since last March.  The only real change is the directive to wear a mask in all common or public places.  So whenever I leave the house I must put a mask on.

Given that there isn't a need to do a lot of preparations for others this year, I have been concentrating on mailing Christmas cards both locally and abroad and finding and wrapping presents for mailing. All of that has now been done.  I just have a few presents to hand deliver to my nephew and his girlfriend. I'm waiting for one package for his present and it is supposed to be delivered in about 10 days time then we will get together in a socially distanced fashion to exchange gifts.

Before I could send my niece her Christmas parcels I had to do some sewing.  Since the sewing machine was out on the table I decided to do some much needed sewing and hemming of trousers. I've been procrastinating about it for ages but I finally completed 4 of them on Monday night.  It's so great to get this done.  I have at least 4 more to do. One of them is the red one lying on the table. I purchased it on clearance (no returns) and it is both too long and too large so it will require taking the waistband apart and redoing it all to take it in a bit. The pants is palazzo style and the material is stretchy so it requires different needles and is more finicky than I like to do. I am not a seamstress so it always takes me time to work up to the effort involved

I've also been getting a few home deliveries for things I need personally and things needed around the house.  I've been waiting a long while for some of the items and managed to get a good deal on everything. One of them is a new towel set though the hand towels haven't arrived yet. I love the blue colour. Normally I'd like blue but it is never the right shade of blue and I get tired of white or gray towels.  These towels arrived at around 5 p.m. and I washed them right away and put them out. They are very soft and larger than my usual towels.

I'm hoping to paint my bathroom soon and put up some shelving and so on. that will be for a future post whenever I get to it. On Wednesday I'm expecting a set of metal shelves on casters which I'll need to put together. I finally decided to purchase the unit after eyeing it for many months on Amazon. I'm hoping it will help me organize my kitchen a lot better and make the work flow far more efficient.

There are 4 pair of pants on the hangers.  The printed leopard is for Fall wear and the white print is palazzo summer wear, it's very nice and lightweight for those hot days.  The other two are yoga pants or athleisure wear for around the house and local errands.

It reminds me I have another purple leopard athleisure pant which I really like but it is far too big and requires significant alterations.  I think I'd like to try and make them over but they are not just straight legged design so it required more work and will have to wait until the new year.

In my effort to help the environment I never put the returnable bottles and containers in the garbage. I save them all up and take them to the recycling depot.  If I am not up to it I put them in the recycle bins or give them to the people on the streets.

I found out that one can put cans and bottles in these blue bags and return them to the recycle depot for drop off rather than wait around. The depot then deposits money into an account that you set up rather than you have to wait at the depot for them to count and give you cash.  A few weeks ago we delivered a lot of cans, juice containers and so on and I got back $20. This was after saving the containers for quite some time.

You can see the big wheelchair is still occupying space in my home. I really wish it was gone but my friends haven't fully raised the funds to purchase a new new battery and charger so the chair will be with me for awhile yet. I believe they have raised about 2/3 of the needed funds.  The woman who needs the chair, really needs the chair because she is paraplegic and has already been waiting about 8 months.  I hope they will be ready to collect it soon.

Last but not least, on Friday night I was shopping at a different grocery store than the one I usually shop at.  I ran into a friend there whom I have not seen for many months. He said he wanted to send me a gift card but since we bumped into each other he would give me cash instead.  What a nice surprise that was. I decided to buy some fresh salmon and made it for dinner on Saturday night. It was delicious.

For the remainder of this week I will continue sewing; hemming, 1 or 2 pair of pants and possibly making a few cushions inserts for the kapok filling I have.  I am hoping to sew up some muslin squares and stuff them.  These are cushion inserts only and I will have to buy or make the cushion covers later. One cannot wash kapok so if the insert covers get dirty you have to take them apart and then you get kapok fluff all over the place. For those that don't know what kapok is, it's a tree fiber that looks like cotton, feels silky to the touch and is sustainably harvested.  The other thing I want to do is wash the carpet and bring up the Christmas ornaments from storage. If time permits I hope to put together the metal shelving and organize it.

We are back to very heavy rain so I won't be going anywhere. Besides I must stay home to receive the items to be delivered.  I was able to capture these scenes on December 4th while it was still dry. These were taken around 7:20 in the morning and there was a pretty pink in the sky.

I may not be posting on line in the next week or two but as always I hope to visit some blogs.

Thank you for stopping by.  Enjoy whatever you are doing this season and keep safe.

Linking up with Our World Tuesday.