Cool Wolf Puppet

I wound up at Cracker Barrel in Joliet twice right before the holidays, once with Daniel to buy St. Nicholas gifts, and then a few days later with Rebekah to celebrate our mutual feasts.

Near the checkout counter was this cool wolf puppet without a price tag. I "googled" it, decided the list price that I found was out of my price range, and walked away.

The puppet was still sitting on the shelf when I returned with Rebekah. She encouraged me to check on the actual price in the store. So I did. $1.99. Yes, I bought it.

Now about that little pill in front of the wolf. That's one of Faith's steroids. 

She gets one each night for life. I found this one on the floor and set it there to show Rebekah. It's not the first time Faith's spit it out unbeknownst to us. 

I'm surprised she's never had an adrenal crisis. Just saying.

The wolf puppet lives on a small bookcase near my computer (within arm's reach), next to a collection of very cool items, all of them (if you can believe it), were gifts.

The lamp at the far left was one of four that Timothy bought for me room.

Every item on the lamp's shelves were gifts.

The blue cardboard thing with drawers was a gift from Ron more than twenty years ago, which he rescued on its path to the garbage when he worked in maintenance at a school.

The handmade wooden box on top of the shelf on top was a gift from a local artist, more than twenty-five years ago. I keep business cards in it.

The little metal box on top of it has a cat pictured on it. I keep business cards in it. It was a gift from Kristina Skaggs. WriteOn Joliet founder, in 2012.

The little incense holder next to the wolf holds tiny incense sticks. For the record, I don't burn anything on this shelf. And I've never used this particular incense holder. But it has a story behind it, so I've kept it.

The typewriter in front of the box holds Qwerty keyboard coasters.

The Christmas box is filled with miniature chocolates. It's now mid-March. You see how fast I eat candy, LOL.

The angel coaster is a gift from Timothy.

The handmade box next to it is a gift from a local artists, more than twenty-five years ago. I keep manuscript clips in it.

The handmade wooden tray next to the box was also a gift, also more than twenty-give years ago. It holds a couple of cool rocks, including one Timothy painted when he was a child, and a set of keys that go to nothing anymore.

Behind the tray is a fake typewriter, a Christmas gift from a friend nearly ten years ago. It holds my voter registration card and a stapler remover, a gift from Ron more than twenty-five years ago.

Next to it is a framed art piece from Rebekah when she was a little girl.

In front of is a very cool candle holder (a gift from Rebekah) and a flameless candle.

The little green bottle next to it are my afternoon/night medicines. So, technically, not a gift (unless you count staying healthy as a "gift of life").

Timothy bought the coffee mug next to it from the Silver Cross gift shop in 2002 when I was in the hospital and shortly before my pheochromocytoma was officially diagnosed. It holds glass wipes and a brush featuring my favorite color of blue (a gift from Rebekah).

Leaning up against the blue cardboard box is the DVD for when John Schlitt, lead member of the Christian rock band Petra (basically, The Beatles of Christian rock), sang karaoke at our house for the members of the youth group Ron and I led. 

Booking John Schlitt was all Ron's idea and I didn't think we could do it. John came out two weeks before my birthday and sang "Happy Birthday" to me, all Ron's idea (and Ron bought a cake). Truly, one of the best gifts Ron ever gave me besides himself.

In greater context the shelf sits directly under my BryonySeries wall in progress. 

These include all five Before The Blood frontispieces  by Christopher Gleason, Munsonville's Main Street by Jennifer Wainwright (which appears on the landing page for the BryonySeries website), the cover to the special edition holiday Visage, and a print of the first cover to the first book in The Adventures of Cornell Dyer series, cover art by Sue Midlock.

Timothy framed all the pieces.

And I still have more BryonySeries artwork patiently awaiting their frames, currently sitting in a box.

And I have many more gifts all over my room.

So even when I'm alone, I'm not, really.

Uncle Barty and Bertrand the Mouse Enjoy an Old Calendar Christmas

On a typical year, Bertrand the Mouse and his Uncle Barty open their Christmas on Christmas Day, December 25.

But with Rebekah and I both getting COVID in the days preceding Christmas Eve, and with my having to work on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, the two little crocheted mice delayed the unwrapping of their gifts until our traditional family Old Calendar Christmas celebration on January 7.

Delaying the gift-opening in no way dampened their excitement of finally seeing what lay inside their gift boxes or their enjoyment of the gifts once they were all opened.

Here are a few photos of  their fun:

In case you were wondering how crocheted mice opening presents...

This is how! They didn't need any help at all.

Bertrand was happy with his new pillow since it matches the red in his ears.

Uncle Barty happily agreed with the saying on his pillow.

The mice were thrilled with their new St. Nicholas stockings.

In fact, they were so thrilled, they insisted on individual photos to show them off. Again, Bertrand was happy with the red one. Red is Bertrand's favorite color.

Uncle Barty was less concerned about the color. He's looking forward to hanging up his stocking on December 5 and wondering what St. Nicholas might bring pretend mice.

"Santa" brought an extra present for Bertrand: the toy reindeer he's always wanted!

The biggest box contained a book for them to share: "Santa Mouse." The mice love books best of all. In fact, that's their mission, to bring the joys of reading to children.

They spent the whole day as quite as pretend mice. And at bedtime, they were snuggled in bed with their new pillows, reading their new book.

The next time I checked on them, they were fast asleep, tuckered out from an exciting Old Calendar Christmas Day.

Elusive Files

This morning I "wasted" about forty-five minutes or so searching for a poem I'd written for our "Christmas letter" when our family delivered newspapers.

These are basically flyers placed in each subscriber's newspaper with information on how to tip the carrier. And I always tried to make these as whimsical as possible.

One year, I wrote a variation of "T'was The Night Before Christmas," which featured the antics of our family slipping and sliding on the snow during delivery, along with a hand-drawn illustration of me, smiling as I walked through the snow to hand a newspaper to a customer.

I didn't find the poem. I may have written it before 2007, which is when I had a computer crash (We delivered from 1998 to the end of 2012).

I've not given up hope. I may have saved a hard copy. I still have boxes from Channahon to unpack.

What I DID find, however, is a series of Christmas letters Timothy had written to various members of our family back in 2010. I had forgotten about these, as he may have, too.

But he'll see them this morning. I emailed them all to him.

BTW, he took the photo of his Christmas tree, as he celebrates his first Christmas in his first townhome.

Blessings to all you this day!