Calories, Crocheting, Charity and Wine

 I have many friends I know personally who use a Fitbit, plus I have a ton of on line friends who wear a Fitbit.  I love the little device and have met face to face with several of my Fitbit friends after knowing them on line.  I consider that a real plus.  It's really lots of fun meeting up with people you chat with on line.  My steps have been way down though lately.  I don't enjoy walking outside in the cold.  It didn't used to bother me.  Last winter I went to the gym and used the treadmill, but I haven't even gotten back into doing that.  I need to.  A couple of those pounds have found their way to my waste again.

 Aren't these cute?  Colorful too.  When my daughter was home for Thanksgiving she and I made these.  Well actually, I made a couple and she made about 10.  I took the picture early in the process.  These are water filter covers.  She's part of a group that sends water filters to Uganda.  Trouble is they are rather fragile and break easily, so they came up with the idea of making a filter cozy out of cotton.  These crocheted cotton cozy help protect the much needed water filters.  I've got a good mound of cotton in my stash and we'll no doubt make more when she comes home for Christmas.  My problem is you need to crochet quite tightly which is hard on my arthritis, so I can't make as many as she can.  I had to switch projects, to something that would bother my arthritis less; and I was trying hard to finish a couple of afghans for my charity, Bridge and Beyond.

This is a wine rack.  Can you tell?  LOL.  It was a kit.  Hubby and I've been looking off and on for one that would fit our space, so we could save space in the kitchen cabinets where the wine and wine glasses have been.

AND.....here it is all put together in corner in the dining room.  It holds 2 cases of wine, though you can see we have some empty spaces.  It holds a dozen wine glasses.  We're pretty happy with it....and it was on sale!

Are you getting ready for Christmas at your house?  I've barely begun.

Setting the Table

 I don't really decorate for Thanksgiving, or really any holidays beyond Christmas.......except I do like to change napkins and placements to be seasonally appropriate.  I purchased these probably last year, and have never used them.  Was actually looking for ones I have that are more Thanksgiving Looking with a pumpkin...but in the process came across these.  Pulled off the price tags and decided this would be a good time try my hand at the napkin folding thing.

You might remember me posting about it a few posts ago.
I choice what appeared to be best match for what I was doing, as I wasn't putting dishes on the table.  This is the 2nd or 3rd from the end of the video, as I recall.  Pockets for your silverware.  I only added a spoon that day, as we were having chili for dinner and only a spoon was needed.

Even though I didn't find or use the Thanksgiving Placemats, I was happy with these very fall like placemats.  LOVE the colors.  Plus my flowers from work for my birthday were indeed a good match color wise.

We did not do Thanksgiving at my house, we went to my older brothers.  Believe there were 19 of us for the feast.  Hope you all had a wonderful and safe holiday and enjoyed special time with friends and family.

Happy Birthday Girl

 This gorgeous bouquet is one of two from my Darling Daughter!!  Sipping my 2nd cup of coffee of the morning, still relaxing in my jammies when the door bell rang.  It was Fed Ex, who rang the bell as they left the box of flowers by the door.  I don't know what some of the flowers are, but they're so pretty.  Pink roses, several shades of pink in the unidentified category and pretty purple.  This bouquet is on the dining room table, and the 2nd bouquet is in the living room.  So I can enjoy these in more than just one room.  Happy Birthday to me.  My DD is so thoughtful.    She'll be home next week for Thanksgiving, can't wait!!  Thank you Darling Daughter!!!

 Those who know me, or have read some of my posts, probably know how found I am of a good Martini!  This Birthday Card really made me laugh out loud.  I sometimes attempt to do some yoga moves.  Mostly my exercise is doing planks, and walking...lots of walking.  One of my Fitbit Friends, Cheryl saw this card and thought of me.  Yep, she knows pretty well.  Thank you Cheryl.

This cute little bouquet is from my work.  They gave it to me yesterday, since I wasn't working today.  Love the pretty fall colors, and the little mason jar.  I am enjoying this in my office.  It's on top of my bookcase.

I'm not a person that really does much about birthdays.  My family really never was.  We're not big card buyers, or gift givers; so it's unusual for me to even post about it.......but hey with pretty flowers and funny card....just thought I'd share.

Are you big on celebrating birthdays?  Do you buy cards for others?

Hubby is taking me out for a nice steak dinner ...and I had a lovely massage earlier today.

So, yeah I'm getting older.  As old as Dirt; but life is good.

Fun Dressing Up the Table

The family dinner table is an important part of family life. Sadly though it seems many families don't sit at the dinner table together as much as they did when I was a kid, or even as much as we did when my own daughter was a child. Many experts say that's a key thing missing in today's society and family structure.  Kids are busy with school and related sports activities and families eat on the go.  But, perhaps with the holidays approaching setting a nice table and sitting together as a family can be achieved.

My husband and I always eat in the dining room, except for Friday night which is traditionally pizza night at our house.  That night we sit in front of the boob tube.  I always use cloth napkins.  They're more environmentally friendly for one, and I like the feel of them over paper napkins.  I've not yet tried these folds, or anything beyond folding flat or rolling; but plan to.  I wonder if the napkins need to be fairly new so they're sorta stiff?

Do you use cloth napkins?  Have you tried these or other pretty/cute folds?  Do you eat at the dining room table?  Leave me your thoughts in the comments below.

This blog has been in moth balls for a while and I'm hoping to fix that.  I recently re-charged my travel blog, Traveling Suitcase, where I'm currently blogging about a wonderful trip to Ireland and Scotland.  I've managed to keep my charity blog, Bridge and Beyond, current.  But, back to napkins, I always pack cloth napkins when hubby and I travel domestically.  We stay in condo's/timeshares so do the bulk of our meals in. 

A Warning about being Hacked

**This is a cut and paste of a post I made earlier today on my charity blog, Bridge and Beyond, thus it's referring to 10 ish days, it's been far longer since I've blogged here.  WOW, just looked at the date and can't believe how longs it's been.  I've always enjoyed blogging and am not sure how I got away from this one.  Perhaps I'll try and get back into it.

If you've been a regular viewer of this blog, you've probably wondered what's happened over the last 10 ish days with no posts.  I was hacked in the answer.  After blogging for YEARS!  I do mean years, Bridge and Beyond has been around 9 years and I blogged prior to that.  I've gotten emails from all over the world, as you know from how wide spread our donations are.  I've NEVER had problems.  

However, there's a first for everything.  I wasn't hacked due to on line searches, nor a variety of emails, nor chatting on line in various groups with people I only know via the net.  NOPE, I was hacked my initiating a phone call.  My initiating a phone call for help with my Skype Account.  Doing a google search I found a 1-800 help line and called.  Things started out fine and dandy, or at least things seemed appropriate in terms of the questions they asked etc to get to the bottom of my problem.  This 800 number appeared in several different places on the net, but it was not a help line for Skype.  At some point during the conversation, a red flag went off in my head...got a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach and so, I said (thankfully), I'm not comfortable with this conversation and am ending it.  he got a bit nasty.  I hung up.  In checking out my account, he used a program called Supremo.  Supremo, appears to be a legitimate program like Team Viewer and the like whereby someone else can see you computer to help you............it however, is a program favorite of hackers and scammers.

I had taken back control of my computer as I ended the call, and I looked to uninstall the program, which I couldn't do.  Googling indicated I could just delete said executable file and so I did.  Computer continued to work normally, so thought I was fine.  Noticed the logo for said program was still on my shortcut toolbar area and preceded to delete it, and couldn't.  My logic at that point, was to reboot, thinking perhaps the delete didn't take hold until a reboot, as often changes/updates etc don't.  

AND now the trouble begins.  Couldn't reboot, turned off the computer and waited about 15 minutes and tried again.  Ultimately I unhooked the internet from the computer (rather hubby did when he came home for dinner), and left the computer off for multiple days.  During that time, I did research via my ipad and found the info about the program Supremo (luckily I had written stuff down as they had me doing things), and did a search for the 1-800 number I had called...............TONS of reports about that number being a scam.

After calling several computer fix it places and getting estimates both about costs to fix and time to repair, I was rather discouraged.  Continuing my research, and something my neighbor told me convinced me I should try to fix it myself.  S L O W L Y, doing one thing at a time I was able to reset my computer, did a variety of virus scans with equipment/programs on windows 10.  My files seemed to be there and be ok, so then braved re-connecting to the internet...........getting excited, it hadn't blown up or anything.  Found additional virus protection, purchased it and loaded it, and did 2 more specific scans.

At this point, there was dancing in the street.  I was sooooooooo relieved, and happy, and excited to have fixed it. I was talking to myself throughout the process.

I'm posting all of this in case it might be of help to anyone else out there.  My neighbor that gave me the one piece of advice was a result of something similar that happened to him at work.  I did not give the guy on the phone any personal info, and thankfully shut things down before he asked for a charge card, which would probably have been the ultimate goal from him, based on everything I read during my research, as well as what my neighbor told me.

Additionally, I like to reinforce something I knew (no doubt you all do too), always keep you computer programs current, do your updates, run regular virus scans, AND trust your gut!

**I still have not resolved my Skype problem, and may not try for some time to come.  While researching that, I came across more than a handful of stories of people who've had issues because of Skype.  Microsoft has purchased Skype and so getting help shouldn't be that hard, but.............it is.

Thank you for bearing with me through this problem.  I had pictures both on the computer and on my camera, but one can not load pictures from a camera to an ipad in order to do any posts here.  I couldn't access the photo's here on the computer to do posts either.  So, will be playing catch up.

PLEASE be careful with all your on line activities folks.

Pick a Project

Good grief, I had no idea it had been so long since I'd blogged here.  I knew it was way way over due, just hadn't realized it had been 8 months.  NEVER in all my blogging years have I gone so long without blogging.  So, this will be a bit of a catch up.  Life's been busy.  I've kept up with blogging on Bridge and Beyond (My charity blog dedicated to taking care of the homeless), have traveled ALOT, have made walking daily and or going to the gym a big part of my daily routine which has greatly helped my arthritis and reduced my cholesterol level.

 The 3 cotton washcloths (knitted), were found when I decided I needed to clean up and organize my project bags.  Totally had forgotten I made them.  They were donated to Bridge and Beyond.  The purple scarf/mobius was also found in a project bag.  I'd started it for darling daughter who loves purple.  The yarn is called Marbles and it's really soft, and very nice to work with.  She decided she'd prefer an infinity/mobius scarf over a scarf scarf .  So...

I finished it and she's a happy camper.  Worked on it after she came home for Christmas, and had it ready for her when she came home to celebrate my Dad's 90th.    Really pays to go through project bags more often.  I also found some extra knitting needles that I thought I'd lost.  LOL

Started this for her as well with yarn given to her as a Christmas gift from a friend.  I think the idea was for her to have yarn to work on something, but it's very very fine fingering weight yarn which she wasn't comfortable with.  Frankly, I wasn't thrilled with it either, so she and I decided to use double thickness.  The gift yarn is the two darker colors, while in Hilton Head I purchased the pretty lavender to blend with it.

Finished this afghan while in Hilton Head also.  One needs lots of yarn and projects for an extended 3 wks vacation.  We go in Jan and Feb so it's not beach weather. And it keeps me busy while hubby's enjoying his golf.  This afghan was made from donated strips I assembled for Bridge and Beyond.  It's called Navajo.

This is Rusty Nail, another ghan I assembled while in Hilton Head.  This one from donated squares and rectangles (some knitted some crocheted).  It was a bit tedious, in that the sizes varied a lot so some rows have 6 squares, some 7.  Both displayed as they were being blocked after being laundered. You might notice the 2 different carpets...we stayed in 2 different locations.

This ghan Dusty Rose also traveled to Hilton Head.  I got started on assembling it, but didn't get it completed while there.  It's also a mix of knitted and crocheted squares from donations of varying sizes through Bridge and Beyond.  Had to spread it out here at home to see what to edge and attach next.  This ghan is still in the works, though progress is much farther along then when this picture taken.

AND found this work in progress also in a project bag....not sure I'm overly happy with the way it looks, perhaps thats why it was buried?  Will give this some thought to decide whether or not to continue or frog this.

AND....yes I need my head examined, as you see I've purchased more awesome yarn and patterns for more projects.  Really....the kit on the left was 65% off, so how could I not order it?  The greens are called woodland I think and the yarn with the orange mix is called Fall.  Why order just 1 kit when you can order 2 at 65% off?  Sorry the yarn on the right and pattern has no picture, it's a triangle type scarf that's called out to me several times, and it was still as good deal at 35% off.

Wish I could tell you that was it for my work in progress projects, but it's not.  I know I have a scarf I started for myself a keyhole scarf that I took off the needles (don't know where I left off), and I know there's at least one ghan I started years ago tucked away.........really tucked away, I haven't even found it, but I know it's here.....somewhere.  I only worked on project bags in my office, not the ones in the basement.  That will have to be another time.

Looking forward to visiting my blog log to see what you all have been up to.  Sorry for the length of this post......but after 8 months...what can I say.