Maggie Turner: Page by Page

I missed Blogmas Day 11!  Well, I was here for it, but my fingers weren’t doing the walking.  It wasn’t an eventful day, the highlight was Attila’s foray to find a Christmas Tree.  He brought home a very nice real tree.  It looked small last night, all wrapped up with twine and frozen. I do love a real Christmas Tree!  When I got up to go the washroom during the night, I was greeted at the bedroom door with the scent of pine.  It is true that certain smells can trigger memories, and my memories connected to the scent of pine are warm and wonderful. The tree did not seem small this morning!  The branches had descended overnight, to their full reach.  Furniture needed further adjustment.  After dinner Attila got out the boxes of Christmas decorations and we spent the evening decorating the tree.  Well, more accurately Attila decorated, I supervised, and we both reminisced. I have been buying bananas when they are marked down.  As it turns out this is working out very well.  There are always spots that are brown and some that are too far gone to use.  I save the slightly brown spots and use them … Continue reading →

An experiment in making my own ACV from crab apples started on September 22, using the crab apples from the volunteer tree in the back yard here at Mist Cottage.  After four weeks the brew had a knock-me-out alcoholic aroma, so the liquid was strained and placed in a sterilized 1 1/2 litre mason jar, topped with a coffee filter held on with a canning ring.  It has been sitting in relative darkness at the back of the kitchen shelf ever since.  I drag it out to check on it every so often.  A fine sediment is forming on the bottom of the jar, there is no mold, the surface is clear, and it smells a little more like ACV every time I check on it.  It isn’t ready yet. Yesterday Attila and I ventured out to try to find a Christmas gift for Luna’s children.  We can’t afford much, and we don’t spend time with the Grandbabies to know what delights them, so it isn’t easy.  We finally settled on a family game, which will be wrapped as a gift for all three of them.  We found a gift along the same line for Terra’s three little ones.  So … Continue reading →

A dollar store clock was purchased for Grace the trailer, but it wasn’t left in Grace over the winter, it came home to Mist Cottage.  It was sitting in the bookcase in the living room at the time that Terra, Sunny, Sky, and Willow dropped in for a visit.  Sky took a shine to it, it needed rescuing, so it ended up safe and sound, hung on the wall.  Now it ticks away in unison with the clock that already sits on the wall in the living room.  Time is a chorus. We moved from our country house, to Mist Cottage, which was 1/3 the size. Downsizing has been an ongoing project, even after three years. One of the cornerstones of downsizing is that if a memento doesn’t bring you joy, you are better off letting it go. Why am I bringing up downsizing? Like downsizing our living space, our Christmas celebrations and expectations have downsized considerably over the years  They were meager indeed to begin with.  For instance, Attila and I ceased to expect that any of our children would spend Christmas Day in our company, with the exception of one Christmas, from the day they left home.  That … Continue reading →

It was good news about the bill from the garage for the car maintenance!  The bill was under $100, so we are good to go there.  The new tires for the car were ordered today, but they won’t be installed for at least another week.  Hopefully Attila won’t run into too much bad weather and bad roads before they get installed. All my websites were checked as to the viability of plugins and themes, after the WordPress upgrade.  Nothing jarring going on there, thank goodness. It has been a quiet Saturday here, sunny and oh so cold.  Attila opted to spend his day working in the basement, rather than in the garage.  It is much warmer in the basement.  He is making some progress in insulating the rim joists, but there is still a long way to go.  There is a lot of stuff down there, and he has to move a lot of it to get near the rim joists. I continue to organize the kitchen, a job which is getting easier and easier.  Today it was sorting through herbs and spices, putting them in jars, labelling, and then finding places to store them.  The chaos is beginning to … Continue reading →

WordPress is up to it again.  A new version, version 5, was released today and my sites all automatically upgraded.  Problems were expected with vintage plugins and themes, but so far as I can make out, mine have weathered the change without incident.  Time will tell.  The editing feature has completely changed, and I am still getting used to it.  Right now I cannot find a way to save my draft entry.  A basic function, perhaps it auto saves.  Time to copy the entry, close it, open it again and see if it is intact!  Eureka, as I was copying the text, the Save Draft function appeared on the screen, flashed, announced that it had auto saved, without any input from me.  Now that the Save Draft function is visible, I am able to use it to save the draft any old time I care to.  Time to play around with this and get a feel for how things work. The weekend approaches.  The project this weekend is to find new tires for the car, the best we can get for a price we manage to pay.  Attila has a nose for bargains, to it is game on. A big … Continue reading →