TDS Day 5: October Status Report

Sitting... in the comfort of a hand built muskoka chair in my living room, on my laptop. I realize most people put their lawn furniture in a shed or the garage for the winter but I am not most people.  I decided over the summer that instead of putting these great chairs (that my son-in-law to be built for me) in the garage for the winter, I was going to get nice cushions for them and put them in the living room instead.  So, minus the cushions I haven't bought yet, that's what I did.

Pondering... what kind of winter we're going to have this year.  Hoping like crazy that it's not one of "those" winters that people are still talking about years from now.  We haven't had one of those in a while and some folks say we're due.  I would very much like for those folks to be wrong.

Drinking... coffee with French Vanilla cream from my thermal mug.  I'm still bummed they discontinued my favorite flavor Cafe Mocha, but while in the states last weekend I discovered about 87 trillion coffee cream flavors I'd never seen before. Oh the things you can get in the grocery stores in the states that you can't get here!!  Headed back down there in about 3 weeks and oh yes, the cooler is coming with us for some fine American food grocery shopping.  I'm so glad the border is only 90 minutes away :o)

Missing... summer.  Lord willing, if I ever get to the place where hubby and I can live south of the border from October through June, I'd do it in a heartbeat.  I absolutely love the summers in southern Ontario and the beginning of fall but the rest is for the birds.

Thinking... about setting up my miniature Christmas village again. I had to borrow one of the tables for it when we had our big Canada Day party back in July so it's sort of a mess right now.  I normally set it up sometime in October so it'll be happening very soon.

Wondering... why it took Kev and I so long to drop the legalistic opinions we had about Halloween. I guess for me it had a lot to do with negative personal experience and for him it was just a matter of respecting my wishes and banning all things jack-o-lanternish from our home.  We had a long talk about it a few weeks ago and have decided to allow the kids to participate in some of the fun traditions this year with some cute costumes. We still wont take it as far as it used to be taken when we were both raging heathens but we have decided letting the kids enjoy the kid-friendly parts of it is okay. I suppose if you did a blog search you could find lots of interesting opinions I've had about Halloween over the years, but I'm in a different place now and Kev and I are both okay with being here.

Enjoying... I should preface that with Immensely since what I'm enjoying is the rejuvination of my marriage relationship.  Kev and I had a great relationship before in most aspects but we'd fallen into a pretty boring rut like most couples tend to do after a while.  When it was brought to our attention we both decided we didn't like it, and took steps to add a little zip and a little zing back into our relationship. I know it might sound sappy but I assure you it's been a wonderful thing for us both to have date night again, send love notes (okay fine they're text messages, we're totally on board with technology, lol), and even get away together, just the two of us.  As much as we are dedicated to our kids, grandkids, home and work, we've given our marriage relationship high priority and it's turned out that everything else is better as a result. It's one of the smartest things we've ever done, and an amazing answer to prayer.

Excited... about the first snow, Christmas lights, cooking an obscene amount of fudge, and all that comes with Christmas.  Yes, I do hate winter but snow is part of Christmas so I only like it for that, then it should all melt and be 86 degrees again.

Listening... to the sound of the furnace fan in the basement below me.  Soon I will need to go down there (we've named it The Scary Place for all the spiders) and clean up summer webs and clean out the wood furnace and start building daily fires.  Not just yet though, thankfully.  It was either last fall or the one before when I opened the furnace to begin cleaning it and a bird flew out at me.  I yelped and fell back right on my butt.  Then I sat there and lol'd at myself, for real.  Silly birds, chimneys are for wood smoke!

Thankful, humbled, and amazed... at God's blessings, provision, grace and peace.  I am blessed beyond anything I have ever deserved with my family, my work, and all the conveniences I so enjoy.  I've lived long enough and been through enough painfully difficult trials to know it could all be gone tomorrow, so I am incredibly thankful for it all today.  Even if it were all gone tomorrow, I would still be thankful that God has been so good to me and blessed me with so much all these 46 years.

And now... the smell of the ham cooking in the oven has reminded me it's time for some yummy scalloped taters to join it.