Tame My Mind

Not much posting the last 4 months of 2008. On weekends, I've been wrapped up in making the Quilt Block Curtains for my craft room (photos to come!), and during evenings, I've been enjoying television sans commercials courtesy of our DVR.

I stopped crocheting at the end of July - I was bored with it and it was too hot to have yarn touching me. I've been thinking about it again though - colorful yarn is a huge draw for me!

Wardrobe Upgrade

I had been thinking about upgrading my "look" at work for about a year or more. Finding dress shoes that fit for Greg and Lauren's wedding in August was one of the triggers I needed to get started!

At the end of October, I began a hunt for shoes for work - Zappos.com is great! I ordered no less than 30 pairs of shoes from Zappos and 3 more pair from 2 other online websites. I kept 6 pair of shoes to use for work - for a total of 9 including the 3 pairs I bought in July. I also have 1 pair of Keds for home use. The remaining pairs of shoes were returned. Free shipping both ways!

The 9 pairs of shoes I have are: 2 brown (low heel, higher heel), 2 black (low heel, higher heel), 1 red (mid heel), 1 bone (mid heel), 1 taupe (low heel), 1 navy (low heel), 1 burgundy (low heel).

Since shoes for my wide feet were no longer a problem, an upgrade to my work wardrobe was in order to look a bit more professional. So, new pants were needed - pants that were not too short to wear with the new shoes! With new pants came the need for new tops. Thank goodness, JCPenney was having an excellent sale on the type of clothes I like to wear! The 2 weeks before Thanksgiving were busy, busy, busy shopping at 3 different JCPenney stores for items in my size. I even bought a $250 black, lined, long winter coat for less than $93 including tax!

I'm hot nearly all the time. Finding short-sleeved tops in my size, in colors I can wear, without frills and patterns (solid colors please!), wasn't easy. I found only a couple - one style that fit really well. So, I searched online and discovered I could order that top in other colors at JCPenney.com. So I did - along with several Pima Cotton (soft!) short-sleeve and 3/4-sleeve tops.

My wardrobe is lovely - and I feel great with my upgraded look!

I also bought new bathroom towels as well as new sheets and pillows for our bed! One set of sheets is deep purple, the other is deep red - very rich!

The Holidays

Thanksgiving was the usual quiet day. Mom and Bryan came for dinner - turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, pie and ice cream. We skipped vegetables in favor of more turkey, mashed potatoes, and stuffing!

Christmas ended up also being quiet. Greg and Lauren were expected but their flight was canceled. Because flights were filled with other holiday travelers and passengers from flights canceled in previous days during the snow storm, alternative flights were not available. So, they stayed in Oregon this year. Hopefully, they'll come down in spring for a long weekend. Mom and Bryan came for Christmas Eve dinner - Bill's wonderful cheesy lasagna!, garlic bread, and pie. Mom came over again for dinner on Christmas Day for yummy lasagna leftovers. We again skipped veggies both days in favor of more garlic bread and lasagna!

Entertainment

DVDs

Through ebay or Amazon, I've bought Seasons 1-4 of Lost, Seasons 1-3 of Prison Break, and Seasons 1-2 of Heroes. While I've already seen these shows, I wanted something I could listen to - but not necessarily have to watch - while working on projects in my craft room. It's been great! I've caught a few things I missed the first time around in all 3 of those television series. I've also ordered the 4-disc collector's series DVD set of Gone with the Wind.

Books

I don't read novels much, but I recently decided I wanted to read some of the classic stories that I missed in high school and wasn't assigned in college - as well as books I liked and want to re-read. The idea is to have books on hand to read here and there. I will keep the books I like so I can re-read them when I want to, and will donate the books I don't want to keep to the college library.

To start with, I have recently acquired:

• Little Women, Little Men, Jo's Boys by Louisa May Alcott (3 books combined in one hardback book) - childhood favorites
• A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
• Dracula by Bram Stoker
• Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
• Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
• A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
• Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw
• Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell - another favorite
• The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings series by J.R. Tolkien (box set of 4 books) - I generally don't like fantasy but I thought I'd give it a chance

Music

After buying Melissa Etheridge's Christmas CD A New Thought For Christmas - which is excellent! - I fell in love with bluesy Christmas music. So, I bought several blues Christmas music CDs and discovered that Charles Brown and B.B. King have great Christmas albums!

Finances

Lots of spending in the past few months. But it's over now - at least for a while. I checked my retirement account savings balance yesterday and am disappointed, but not surprised considering the market slide in the past months, to see that it's down about $80,000! Ack!