Duke’s Mixture 12.01.2021: Currently & More

 

Sweet friends, it’s the first of the month, which means it’s time for Duke’s Mixture 12.01.2021.  In this edition, I am joining my friend Anne at In Residence again for her monthly Currently link-up.  Today we are sharing some holiday currentlies – decorating, feeling, sending, smelling, and wrapping.  And I’m combining Currently with a Duke’s Mixture of other things.  Throwing in a little hodgepodge and a whole lot of gratitude.  I hope these posts are as much fun to read as they are to write!!

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CURRENTLY 12.2021

 

Decorating…

the front porch.  For now.  We are going to be in Ft. Worth helping Brennyn and Mustafa with baby Declan (due to make his debut 12.20.2021) during the holidays.  Have decided not to drag out all of the Christmas decorations when the kitties will be the only ones home to enjoy them.  Hope to at least put out some snowmen and snowflake decorations to get me through til Valentine’s Day!!

Feeling…

all over the place.  Happily anticipating hugging my mom and mother-in-law.  Anxious to hug my shiny new grandson in less than 3 weeks now…once he is born!!  A little sad to know I will be away from home on Christmas.  And will miss seeing Lucia and Cami open presents.  But tickled that I will be with Cady when she opens hers!!  Little bit concerned about flying with this silly virus still causing problems all over the country.  But we have our boosters on board.

Sending…

copies of our book of the month to gals in my online book club.  Each month the members of “Come Read With Me” vote for our next read.  Then I have a giveaway for a copy of the winning title.  I always pose a question to the group and the member with the closest answer wins a copy of the book.  The question this month was “How many Christmases have I spent entirely alone?”  And this month, there were 3 winners!!

Our book for December is The Santa Suit by Mary Kay Andrews.  Some months our voting ends in a tie and we have to have a run-off.  These girls make the voting so much fun!!  This month there was a clear winner and because I am the book club boss, I was privy ahead of time as to which book was going to win.  So I started The Santa Suit a little early.  Interested to see where this story is going to go.  Our second place book was another seasonal title, The Christmas Bookshop by Jenny Colgan.  Hoping to get around to it, too, before the season is behind us.

   

Smelling…

all the holiday fragrances at Bath and Body Works.  As you may know if we have been pals for awhile, almost every Sunday PC and I go to church then walk around the outlet mall.  One of the stores we always visit is Bath and Body Works.  Not sure who loves that store more…PC or me!!  Some Sundays we just go in to sniff.  Other Sundays we go in to do some serious smelling and buying.  Last weekend everything in the store was 50% off, so we loaded up on pillow and body mists.  I really believe spraying them on our pillows is helping us sleep better.  We are currently using BBW’s Sleep pillow and body mist (chamomile-bergamot) from their Aromatherapy collection.  But they are all delicious.

Wrapping…

not a darn thing.  Yet.  In the 9-day window between our trip to Mom’s and our trip to Ft. Worth, I am going to need to do a whole lotta shopping and wrapping.  I do have PC’s gifts purchased.  But just haven’t gotten out the wrapping paper yet.

And Wrapping Up…

In another sense of the word, I’m looking forward to wrapping up 2021 and seeing what 2022 holds.  Hope you will join me for 10 on the 10th where we will be talking about the holidays and anticipating the new year.  Be sure to grab the graphic below for your post.

December’s 10 on the 10th

Here are the questions:

• In what ways do you decorate for the winter holiday season?  Do you use traditional colors or have your own color scheme?  Is there a theme to your decorating?
• Share a family holiday tradition or recipe.  Is there something new you plan to try this year?
• Do you have a favorite Christmas book, movie, song or TV show?  Why is it special to you?  Is there a popular holiday book, program or movie you have never seen?
• How do you handle the stress of the holidays?  Do you have some go-to for restoring calm to your life when things get crazy?
• What will you wear over the holidays?  Do you dress up for New Year’s Eve?
• How do you feel about snow?  What are the chances you will see a white Christmas?  Do you enjoy any snow day activities?  What will the weather be like where you live in this last month of the year?
• Do you have a gift-giving budget?  For how many people do buy gifts?  Do you buy for the postman, your hair dresser, nail tech, children’s teachers?  When do you open gift?  Who is the hardest person you buy for?
• If you could give a kind of impossible gift to someone, what would it be?  Perhaps something beyond your price range?  Or something you can’t buy.  Something intangible.
• As we bid farewell to 2021, what was your biggest success this year?  Will you be making goals or resolutions or plans for 2022?  If so, what will some of them be?
• Describe 2021 in 3 words.  Name 3 things you wish for in 2022.

HodgePodge

 

Here are the questions to this week’s Hodgepodge from my friend Joyce at From this Side of the Pond. Hodgepodge is a weekly series going live on Wednesdays but I do well to participate once a month.  Joyce’s questions are always so much fun, though, that I would really miss it if I didn’t join in now and then.  After reading one of Joyce’s recent blog posts, I discovered we have much in common.  Looking forward to getting to know her better beyond hodgepodge in the future.

Gift Giver

1. When it comes to gift giving are you more of a ‘create something from scratch’ or a ‘buy something in a shop’ kind of giver? Tell about a favorite homemade gift you’ve given or one you’ve received.   In my younger days when money was scarce, I tended to make things to give as gifts.  For a length of time, I made cross-stitch pictures for loved ones.  Baby announcements for my nieces and nephews.  Cross-stitched quotes or verses for my parents.

2. Do you have the ‘gift of gab’? Is that a blessing or a curse?  When I am comfortable, I can be quite talkative.  And even make sense.  But when I am with people I am not comfortable around, I might be blabbing up a storm but can say the darned things!!  A lot of which don’t make a lick of sense.  Being able to talk with anyone at any time would be a blessing from my point of view.

And That’s a Wrap

3. What’s something you have going on that you need/want to ‘wrap up’ this month? Not sure it is going to happen, but I need to wrap up the online notary public course.  You might remember I registered to become a notary in order to make a little extra money.  Turns out Texas notaries only make $6 a throw.  So I am not going to get rich by any means!!

I signed up and started an optional online course about the policies and procedures for Texas notaries.  Had a month to complete it by 10.22.2021.  Which I thought meant I would have through 10.22 to finish.  I was lacking 2 units when I signed on that morning to complete the course only to find out my time had expired.  Now I have to pay the registration fee again and start all over from the beginning.  And then I need to earn 8 notary commissions to break even on the course, and earn 14 more commissions to pay for the notary kit.

4. A food you love that is ‘wrapped’ in some way?  My first thought was an egg roll.  But then I realized burritos are the epitome of a wrapped food!!  And El Paso, Texas is the home of many a tasty burrito.  We just started sampling burritos for our burrito run activity on my autumn bucket list.  Our neighborhood Casa de Torta wraps all kinds of goodies inside their homemade tortillas to create some mighty awesome burritos.

Hope

5. December is upon us…share something here (quote, verse, poem, song lyric, your own thoughts) related to the word hope.

 

6. Insert your own random thought here.   My nephew Jacob shared this in his Instagram story today.  When I bragged on him to my brother (his dad), Kevin told me he had originally shared it with Jacob.  And sends similar things to both of his adult kids a couple of times a week.  Good parenting, Kevin!!  Hope you will take just a second to follow the link to read “7 Signs That You Are Doing Better Than You Think You Are.”  Click here.

Moving right along in this potpourri of a post, here’s what I am thankful for this Thursday.

STRAIGHT FROM MY GRATITUDE JOURNAL

 

My Thankful Thursday posts are usually made up of ‘gratefuls’ I’ve listed in my gratitude journal over the week or month, whatever length of time has elapsed since my last Thankful Thursday post. In this case, it has been a couple of weeks since I wrote my last Thankful Thursday, here.  Rest assured, though, there are always lots of things to be thankful for even if I don’t get around to writing a post about them all.

Joining Rebecca Jo at Knit by God’s Hand and Jennifer at All 4 Boys in sharing the hosting responsibilities for the Thankful Thursday series.  Some weeks, you might discover posts from all 3 of us, other Thursdays, it might just be one of us hosting.  Sometimes you might find a post from me on a Friday!!  But whatever the case, YOU are always welcome to join us!!

STRAIGHT FROM MY GRATITUDE JOURNAL

I did a lot of thinking about health in November.  My mom had lots of ups and downs, I had several annual preventative measures, Lauren is always battling health issues, and Brennyn’s family was sick with some kind of stomach bug.  She is in her 36th week of pregnancy and we are hoping baby Declan can stay in place 4 more weeks.

This week I am especially thankful for:

• 5 senses that were miraculously created and make life more pleasurable
• my relatively strong and resilient body that has carried me through 63 years of life
• healthy children and grandchildren
• vaccinations of all sorts but currently the Covid vaccine
• a few minutes quiet in my days
• sleeping well naturally, without melatonin
• PC’s relationships with the girls and their girls
• beautiful weather with afternoons in the upper 60s and low 70s
• Sharon and Davettte listening to my woes
• crafting with Valerie
• Kevin being there for Mom over and over and over and over
• HelloFresh

And…

• baby Declan is in a higher percentile for weight…he is not going to be as small as we feared
• Paul went with me to talk to the lawyer about mediating for help with our pool
• baby Mason, who Brennyn revived with 17 minutes of CPR at birth 2 years ago, is thriving
• Fluff, Purrsimmony and Purrsnickitty and now Pumpkin, Lauren’s pup
• pain in my neck and back are much relieved
• normal mammogram
• Cami asked to talk with me on the phone, told me she missed me
• potato soup and the means to buy, prepare and enjoy our Thanksgiving feast
• PC helping me cook
• meeting my StepBet challenge and winning $9.46
• popcorn
• sweet, sweet message from Valerie and the book club gals
• A+ report from hygienist on my dental hygiene

Ta-da, that is just a few of the things I have been blessed with in the last few weeks.

YOUR TURN

 

Would love to hear some of your responses to the Currently prompts, or the HodgePodge questions or to read what you’re especially thankful for.  Hope you will also link up your Thankful Thursday post with us and stop by to visit Anne, Joyce, Rebecca and Cathy and some of the others linked up below.

Well, I am a day late on my ironing.  And not a soul has stepped up to start working on my pile for me!!  Soooo, going to get that ironing board out.  Anyone else iron clothes before you put them in the suitcase?

Hope your first days of December are pleasant ones.  Thank you for warming my heart with your visit.

Hugs and kisses,