Fun In The Snow

We in the Midwest are into our third day of snow! We had had several inches fall about four days before Christmas and then for three days before Christmas, we had warmer weather and rain. We had so much rain that there was flooding all around, and Christmas Day began as gloomy and wet. Then around noon on Christmas it started snowing again and it has been snowing ever since! This is the front of our house, and the picture below is of the back.

I don't exactly know what happened with the above picture, but the flash on the camera may have illuminated some snowflakes, because it looks like magical lights falling from the sky!!

This is Jess' favorite perch. She sits here several times each day and surveys her back yard to make sure there are no intruders encroaching. She watches the birds on the feeders and occasionally barks at the kittens playing. She also watches for my husband to back the car out of the barn when she is going for her walk and sits whining until she sees him drive around to the front of the house. Then she jumps down and runs to the front door!

She LOVES to play in the snow and would stay out there for hours in the cold, but we bring her in to warm her feet. Maybe she needs some doggy boots.

Her whiskers got all icy and frosty, but she didn't want to come into the house just yet.

She still had some running and playing to do. We finally picked her up and bodily carried her into the house to warm up. She then took her nap and rested up for more play in the snow. We need to teach her to toboggan down the hill!!

Pix of My Christmas Stuff!

I'm sorry for being so absent lately, but things have been pretty hectic for me. I've been spending long days away from home and have been pretty wiped out when I do get home! I did finally get around to decorating for Christmas, so I hope you enjoy the pictures. One request...please don't focus on the layer of dust on my floors and furniture. I did get the decorating finished, but the cleaning is still on my "to do" list. We have for years and years always bought Frazier fir Christmas trees. I still LOVE the scent and look of the Frazier, but we waited so long to get our tree this year that they were sold out in our area. Since we were in a hurry, we decided to put tradition on hold this year and buy a kind of tree that we had never even heard of. It is called a Plantation Grand Fir. The needles are very soft and it is VERY full. The branches are a little wimpy, but I managed to find enough sturdy ones to hang the heavier ornaments. I decorated it in gold and silver, but I did add a few small green glass ball ornaments, too. I also used several different icicle ornaments, as well. It is a little different look from our usual more primitive tree, but I do like it.

Yet another wooden bowl! This is another 17" diameter bowl filled with pears that my daughter and I made. I also added some small grapevine balls and some dried oranges. I like the primitive look. The garland around the bowl is adorned with gold berries and gold bells. It was a great find at a local nursery.

This cupboard is in the hall near our bedrooms, and it holds all our DVDs! I loved this cupboard as soon as I saw it and left it as found for several years. Last year, I decided to paint it, and I love it even more now!

This is the entry to our home. As you can see I love the large candy canes. They are described later in this post since I haven't figured out how to re-arrange pictures after they are uploaded, so my post is all out of order. Oh, well, I hope it all makes sense eventually!

I really liked this candle holder/star when I saw it in the same local nursery I mentioned earlier. Bottle-brush trees are another thing that I have collected for a few years. I now have a virtual forest of bottle-brush trees. This year I spread them out all over the house instead of displaying them all together. It is fun to change decorations around each year. It would be less interesting to do everything the same every year, don't you think?

My sister gave this sled to me a few years ago. I love the antique look, but I don't think it is really old. It is made of iron and wood, and I added the greenery, glass balls and ribbon to add a Christmas touch.

A garland of greenery with pine cones dresses up my hanging wooden bowls. Love it!

These glass ornaments are very heavy and change in appearance in different light. You can see through the glass in daylight, but at night the finish is like old mirror. They are large (approx. 6" in diameter). Looks Christmassy outside with the snow!

This swag hangs on the door of the ash cupboard which belonged to my husband's grandfather.

The above picture is my "beloved" large wooden bowl filled with 8" whitewashed grapevine balls, greenery and red berries. I love the look, and use this as my dining table centerpiece.
This is a large hand painted tin bucket that I have filled with various greenery, berries and one of my favorite things, three of my large prim candy canes. I have collected these for a few years and buy them whenever I find them for half price after Christmas. I just last weekend found two more! The candy canes are approx. 32" tall, so it makes a nice large display.
This little snowman is my favorite Christmas ornament. He is really cute in a primitive sort of way, and adds some winter whimsy wherever I decide to hang him every year.
Antique ice skates are a fun winter touch. The ribbon adds a little shimmer for Christmas! I haven't quite figured out how to move pictures around once I upload them, so I'm going to add more pix which may end up above these. Sorry for the confusion!!

Well, even though things got out of order, I hope you enjoyed seeing a little of my Christmas decorating this year. I always love to see what others do and many times get some great ideas for my own home.

Merry Christmas!

URGENT INFORMATION!! PLEASE READ.

This is so urgent. Please go to http://www.biggovernment.com and read the article about health care being written in prison. Here is some of the "why" for what is happening in our country with regard to health care and other socialistic change:

Robert Creamer (IL Rep.Jan Schakowski's husband) who is a convicted felon, wrote a lengthy political manual, Listen to Your Mother: Stand Up Straight! How Progressives Can Win (Seven Locks Press, 2007).

"In the book, Creamer draws lessons from decades of experience on the radical left, including the teachings of arch-radical Saul Alinsky, and several episodes from Rep. Schakowsky’s political career. He also lays out a “Progressive Agenda for Structural Change,” which includes a ten-point plan for foisting universal health care on the American people in 2009:"

•“We must create a national consensus that health care is a right, not a commodity; and that government must guarantee that right.”
•“We must create a national consensus that the health care system is in crisis.”
•“Our messaging program over the next two years should focus heavily on reducing the credibility of the health insurance industry and focusing on the failure of private health insurance.”
•“We need to systematically forge relationships with large sectors of the business/employer community.”
•“We need to convince political leaders that they owe their elections, at least in part, to the groundswell of support of [sic] universal health care, and that they face political peril if they fail to deliver on universal health care in 2009.”
•“We need not agree in advance on the components of a plan, but we must foster a process that can ultimately yield consensus.”
•“Over the next two years, we must design and organize a massive national field program.”
•“We must focus especially on the mobilization of the labor movement and the faith community.”
•“We must systematically leverage the connections and resources of a massive array of institutions and organizations of all types.”
•“To be successful, we must put in place commitments for hundreds of millions of dollars to be used to finance paid communications and mobilization once the battle is joined.”
Creamer adds: “To win we must not just generate understanding, but emotion—fear, revulsion, anger, disgust.”


You can see from reading just these few objectives, that there is an orchestrated effort by progressives to take away our America and to replace it with this socialistic version. If you have tried to discuss health care reform with any proponent of President Obama's health care plan, you will recognize ALL of the above points!! Please educate yourself about these people and understand the future that they want to force upon us. It is truly frightening!


"Creamer’s broader aim, as laid out in his book, is the “democratization of wealth” in America and “progressive control of governments around the world.” As he recently wrote on his blog at the Huffington Post: “If we succeed in winning health insurance reform we will have breached the gates of the status quo. We will demonstrate that fundamental change is possible. Into that breach will flow a wave of progressive change.”

If you don't want this "progressive" change, then please do everything you can to expose their agenda and its consequences for Americans.