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Sunday Snippet: The All Things Spring Edition
Okay, so maybe not ALL things, but I’ve got little to say today, I’m going to share some beauties from my yard (and my neighbor’s yard) with you. It’s been a long week. We spent most of it up at the lake getting ready for the contractor to come and tear out our old deck and start building the new one. That involved a lot of raking of old wet leaves and picking up sticks and brooming off the old deck of maple twirly things. I know we’ll be doing the twirly thing again next time we go up, but it was a noble effort on our part. I weeded,…
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Sunday Snippet: The Forgetting to Remember Edition
Or is it Remembering to forget… Anyway, yesterday, we drove up to the lake and opened up our cottage for the season. We don’t always open this early, but we’re having our deck replaced and are meeting the contractor on Sunday, so we decided, what the heck, we’ll just get opened up. The boat won’t go in until after the deck gets finished, which put us at late May for boating, but that’s fine. We still enjoy being here for the fellowship, the walks down to the docks to check out the bay, and the peace of our little slice of heaven. I had to make lists this past week…
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Sunday Snippet: The Good-Hearted Woman (A Heart Update) Edition
Glenda, you are my winner! I’ll contact you for your email to send your ebook to you. Hugs to all who stopped by and wished me and my heart well. I soooo appreciate you! A good-hearted woman. That would be me, mes amies … well, sort of. I had an appointment with my cardiologist on Monday last week. The first one in a year because I had been doing well and the every-three-months checkups seemed excessive. This time, though, I had some concerns—I’ve been more tired than usual, I’m getting breathless again when I walk with the ladies, and my blood pressure is consistently in the hypotension (low blood pressure)…
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Sunday Snippet: The Closing Up the Lake Edition
It’s quiet here at the lake this weekend. There is a sort of abandoned feeling in the air here in our little lake community. Most folks have already closed up their cottages for the season; a few (like us) hang on a bit longer. But this is our weekend to close up, winterize the cottage, and leave the lake for another year. Fall is definitely on the way out. The cottonwoods and maples and walnut trees have pretty much dropped all their leaves. (Mostly on our deck, roof, and driveway) On our way up to the lake yesterday, the soybean fields and cornfields were harvested and empty. Winter wheat will…
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Sunday Snippet: The Autumn at the Lake Edition
Autumn is my favorite time of the year, even though I’m often restless and sad in the fall. It’s an ending in so many ways, and yet there is that feeling of joyful beginning that comes with Thanksgiving and the start of the holiday season, even when the world is suddenly a scarier and more uncertain place. Fall is sweatshirts and jeans and corduroy jackets and yoga pants and maybe even scarves now and then, but not yet heavy winter coats and gloves and hats. It’s walks in the neighborhood that leave you feeling smugly exercised, but not particularly sweaty. It’s trips to the orchard for apples and cider and…
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Sunday Snippet: The Lake Life Reality Edition
We are in our 14th year here at the lake. It’s hard to believe we’ve had our cottage for so long, particularly given that we waited for so long to buy one. It seemed like whenever we were ready to buy, cottages were just out of our reach and when they were in our reach, we weren’t in a position to consider buying one. Fourteen years ago, when this marriage-long dream came true, we were overjoyed. We still are, although the realities of lake life are a little different from the fantasies. This is a rehash of the harsh realities of lake life, but I’m doing it again anyway because…
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Sunday Snippet: The Remembering to Be Truly Grateful Edition
I know that I post a paragraph of weekly gratitude each Sunday, but sometimes it’s hard to find reasons to be grateful. I write every morning in my gratitude journal–five things from the day before that I’m thankful for, but I find myself repeating–home, Husband, family, friends–all things I am truly grateful for. But these days are harder than most and only appear to be getting harder. Gratitude is a struggle when the news of the nation and the world is bad. So today, I’m going to focus on all the good in my life and how very blessed I am. (I promise not to be sappy–I’m probably lying about…
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Sunday Snippet: The Opening Weekend Edition with Chicks and Ducklings and Turkeys…Oh My!
There’s a particular scent that always pervades the first weekend of being at the lake–it’s a mixture of citronella and watermelon candles, mothballs (to keep the critters away) and pink antifreeze, bleach, and a slight mustiness that means you’re at the lake. This year, it hit us as soon as we opened the front door. We both inhaled deeply and grinned at each other and said, in unison, “We’re at the lake!” Pic is Husband in his happy place–the lake! We’ve been working most of the past two days getting the cottage ready for another summer. Husband turned on the water (which involves more than turning a knob–he has to…
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Sunday Snippet: The Things I Should Have Mentioned in 2024 Edition
It’s January 5 and maybe a few days late for rehashing 2024, but I have few memos for the past year that I need to get off my mind before I plunge into 2025. Dear Summer 2024, Where did you go? I mean seriously? I know the summer lasted the usual 3-4 months, but it sure didn’t feel like it was that long. We didn’t get enough lake time or enough time to go out exploring state parks and places of interest as we’d planned to do. Stick around and be more organized in 2025, okay? Longingly, Nan ~*~*~*~ Dear Election, Sigh. What can I say? Things did not end…
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Sunday Snippet: The Focusing Elsewhere for a Minute Edition
This week, writing, finding my creative escape has been really hard as current events have overwhelmed me. But if I am the writer that I claim to be, that I want to be, shouldn’t I be able to write, no matter what? I always maintain that writing is essential to who I am and it is, but there are days, now and again, where I want the people in my head to just sit quietly for just a little bit, while I take a deep breath and recenter. So, I’ve been focused elsewhere the past couple of days–getting ready to close up the lake cottage. It’s November 10 and it’s…