Turning Hate to Love (or Like)

In 56 days fall will begin (I'm writing this post on July 28th.) It's always been a toss-up as to which is my least favorite season, autumn or winter. Most hurricanes arrive during fall, and then there's the whole pumpkin spice insanity that takes over the world. I do like making Thanksgiving dinner, but otherwise, pass. As for winter, I've promised to stop hating Christmas, but honestly, I will never love it. No one will let me skip the holidays, so I have a lot of pretending to be cheerful and going along with the Christmas nonsense. I do like the change of seasons as far as colder weather arriving, but that's all.

At this time in my life I sometimes resent how much I have to do (along with all the work involved) to celebrate seasons I've disliked since I was a child. I do like making others happy, however, and I will continue to set aside my dislike and do the work for them. If/when the day comes that I ever live on my own, I often consider what I'd do to put swift end to all this autumn and winter hoopla. It's the very worst of the herd mentality I can't escape. Like the birthdate I hate celebrating, I'd like it all to stop.

Unfortunately I've reached an age when I don't have all that many autumns or winters left to really dislike. I can probably count my future years on two hands (maybe only one if I take a bad turn with my health.) It seems wrong to hate half the year when your years are dwindling rapidly. I need to find some joy in these seasons before I run out of them and I'm not around even to grumble about and resent them.

For autumn I am planning to mend, make over and donate as many Vera Bradley upcycled bags as I can, so thrift shoppers can buy them as holiday gifts. That will be a creative, happy thing for me to do. I'm also going to makeover our guest room so that it's more comfortable and welcoming for our nephew and our daughter when they visit. I love makeovers.

Winter is the tough one because of Christmas, but this year our nephew will probably be living with us. I am going to work on some new house decorations and try out some new holiday-themed recipes so I can make his Christmas a nice one. I like cooking and making things, so that should help boost my spirits. I'm also going to try to thrift or make at least one gift for everyone I love.

There's nothing wrong with disliking this time of year, I know that. I also know that negativity drains my energy and leaves me wallowing in unhappy memories. I'd rather spend my time to make new, better ones. So that's my plan. :)

Image Credit: Image by Image by Melanie from Pixabay

T-minus Day

This was our little Thanksgiving dinner last year, when it was just the three of us. Time keeps whittling down my favorite holiday; this year it will be just me and my guy, and we likely won't even have a turkey.* That will be a first in 35 years. I feel about Thanksgiving the way other people do about Christmas, and while it's a lot of work it's my favorite holiday. Of all the Thanksgivings I've had in the past sixty years, only three were truly terrible: one when I was a kid that I don't talk about (#1 most miserable); the time I roasted two turkeys together and hosted fifteen people whom I cooked for and served with zero help (the largest and #2 most miserable); and the one I spent in basic training (the #3 most miserable.) I have no pictures of any of those, thank heavens. In addition to doing all the cooking I'm the one who takes all the pictures, washes all the dishes and puts away all the leftovers. I suppose no one else cares because to them it...

Fell Off the Wagon

I did cut up that plastic dollar tote to make into something stronger, but got caught up with work and set it aside. Then last night some hand-dyed silk and pretty threads called my name, and, well . . . Felt SO good to do some handwork, except my neck began hurting about an hour into it. I tried changing the way I sit and work, but it's pretty obvious that the doc is right.

Old Loves & Such

My guy kindly bought me my favorite Chinese take out the other night, and my fortune cookie offered up an interesting story starter: This sounds sweet, right? Only the first thing I thought of was an old love coming back from the dead . . . . must be October. In other lovely news, my favorite hand-dyed thread artist, Lorraine from Colour Complements , is moving her business from Etsy to her own web site. Many of my favorite sellers on Etsy are leaving due to the whole "free shipping" coercion debacle, which has also soured me on the site. To show support I did a little shopping at Lorraine's web site and got in these: I love her threads and trims; you simply can't buy anything like them anywhere. Her work makes my specialty thread box look like a treasure chest: At night I'm spending just as hour working on quilting the scrap project runner, and I'm making slow progress: I'll keep quilting the runner while I try to decide on a design for t...

Valerean

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