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I'm tired of cooking/preparing 3 meals a day. It's just the two of us but boy oh boy can that woman eat!! She stays slimish, I get fattish. It's bad enough I do everything here much less start making her one thing and me the other. At times I feel guilty when I buy her fast food cuz of the nutritional value....not to mention I eat it too.

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Ana - that takes the cake. Somehow doesn't surprise me after seeing what R has been going through with insurance.

Psue -you are well organized. Here it gets done when it gets done. As mother got older her eye sight was not quite as good - my housekeeping improved lol. I always feel sorry for plastic people. Glad you had some good experiences. Ironed Levi's sound about right. When we went to the dinner theatre the other week I wore a sequined dress. I like to dress up once in a while and occasionally I like bling!!!! R wears a smart shirt and dress slacks. Nowadays out here no one dresses up much. I do if I feel like it.

DD has kept her joy. Not that she hasn't been through some hard times, of course, but she doesn't dwell on it. All tests have been clear to date and she is optimistic, but also realistic about her future. And she has her faith. She is getting back into training in a gym and generally building herself up physically.

Glad to hear you are 20 years from that experience and were able to recapture your joy during it.
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Golden, in hindsight I feel a little sorry for those plastic people. I’m not sure it was their fault that they had to put so much effort into being seen by the right people every weekend. I really don’t know how they kept it up without hollowing out and caving in on themselves.

I did see some beautiful sights and gained a huge appreciation for Event Planners but in those years I only made a couple lasting friendships. When DH took a transfer to a place where ironed Levi’s were considered appropriate formal evening attire I packed up all the pretties and donated them to St. Vincent de Paul. Good riddance.

I am dismayed to hear about your DDs cancer. Has she responded well to treatment? I felt the same way at the end of chemo - it took me a full year to feel even close to normal. October marked my 20th year since diagnosis and the start of treatment, with no recurrence. I know it’s different for everyone but has she been able to hold onto any amount of joy through it?

Joy was my biggest loss, but when it came back, it came roaring back to the point where I annoyed my friends and family so much they talked about buying me a weighted vest to keep me from floating away and becoming one with the universe! I’ve learned to tone it down a little. : )
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Geaton, that is ridiculous! Don’t you wish we could plant and grow logic?
My mother’s birthday triggered an audit of her holdings with an insurance company. I am POA. The annuity dept didn’t want to pay because they wouldn’t accept that she was alive. The life insurance dept didn’t want to pay because they wouldn’t accept that she was not alive. Well, she’s one or the other!
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My whine today: I’m stalling on my iPad.
Its F-riday which means and I’m supposed to be doing F-loors.
I also have to do T-hursday T-oilets that I didn’t get done yesterday.

(I know, T-uesdays would make better T-oilet days but Tuesday is too far from the weekend when mom comes to visit.
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nacy - nice idea with the scarves. Just like crocheting grannie squares and putting them together to make an afghan. Homeless need scarves.

geaton - WHAT A PAIN!!! Bureaucracies are the worst. And the left hand never knows what the right hand is doing. Hope you got it sorted.

Psue - Even the cat was black and orange. The place needed some colour. Musical theatre would be a great training. My 2 oldest were/are in that world. Dd did a diploma in Theatre Technology and oldest son in Theatre Arts. He has kept his connections and does some theatre even now.
I wonder how you survived the "functions" and the plastic people. You can only smile so much! I've touched on that world at times and it freezes my soul. Good for DH retaining himself through all that.

Sorry about your need for chemo. Dd is just finishing up her next to last session. One more to go. She told me recently if there came a need for another bout of this particular treatment she would think long and hard and want to be sure about significant benefits to repeat it. It's been a long three years. She did fine with surgery and radiation but the chemos have hit her hard.
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Nacy, if you’re looking for places to use up your practice knit hats, scarves and lap blankets check out your local hospital oncology department. I still have my chemo beanies; they were a great comfort to me. Another thing I still have is a rice filled bean bag the nurses would heat in the microwave and rest on my arm while pushing that refrigerated fluid into my vein. A simple sewing project with such compassion in the stitches.
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Whoa, Geaton! I had no idea the PoA rules were so restrictive! I learn something new here everyday.
Sending a virtual French 75.
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Golden, once again I am delighted by your storytelling. You have the gift of making word-pictures. More, please!

1970’s Halloween! I LOVE it! Especially since I just finished a remodel of our funky 1977 house. I love the era and kept a lot of the funk but, boy-oh-boy, it was so dark and dingy!

When I started dating DH he was required to attend a lot of fancy ‘functions’ for work. That was not a world I could afford. I had made my 1st wedding gown and prom dresses and had done musical theater in school so I had some experience. I spent M-F nights after work sewing sparkly things and Saturday night wearing them. It was fun for awhile, then I got kind of disgusted with it and with the plastic people. I’m still amazed at how my DH was able to slot himself into that world so successfully without losing the dirt poor, barefoot, boy at his squishy center.
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Here's something that happened this week:

I was at our DMV to get a duplicate car title in order to sell my Mom's car (don't get me started on why I had to do that in the first place -- it's a post for another day...a day of martinis). The clerk asked for my PoA paperwork. She unstaples it to scan the page where it gives me the authority to get the duplicate and the notarized page. Restaples it and gives it back.

Fast forward to a week later when I'm there again with the buyers (my brother-in-law and his wife). The clerk (a different one) asks for the PoA paperwork again. This time the clerk says that the PoA paperwork is now unacceptable or at least suspect because it obviously has been unstapled and restapled. What the...???? When I informed her that her own clerk did that she said it wasn't possible (but it was cuz I saw it with my own 2 peepers).

Moral of the story:

Never say, "You people did that" to the cranky clerk at the DMV.

and

DO NOT UNSTAPLE and the RESTAPLE your original PoA paperwork.

I get why this can be an issue but literally no other institution ever commented or even l@@ked at the "staple status" of any of the 3 PoA documents I had for my 3 principals over the years. No attorney ever told me this might be a deal-breaker.

Maybe it's only at the DMV. Maybe it's only at the MN DMV. You might want to check in your home states.
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Golden and peasuep, wow 😲 I'm impressed, formal wear and quilts! That's very impressive.

😂 I was thinking that , my knitting abilities is a scarf, I'm sure my kids wouldnt really appreciate many scarfs. So I was actually thinking of knitting a bunch of scarfs , complementary colors, then connecting them, to make a throw blanket.

Then when Im better, try something new. Being nerodivergent it's harder work to learn new things, but once I get it down I don't loose it, just takes longer to get it down.
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Ana - the mending. Oh my goodness, and hemming new dress pants. I even embroidered flowers over a few holes/rips in the jeans, I used to have a day in the spring when I took all their whites and scrubbed and stain removed brightened and so on to make them respectable.

Then there was the annual sock hunt when I told the kids to put all their unmatched socks on their beds, then visit each other to find matches. We found quite a few and the rest went into the rag bag for polishing etc. It was fun for them.
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Psue - wow formal wear I never did that. You were a sewing whiz!!! I wouldn't have dared try sequins or bead work.

I really enjoyed doing the quilt and thought about doing one for each grandchild, and some sofa cushions but never did. When dd was in a funk once and I went to stay with her we redid her apartment decor - which was 1970s Halloween. We found a craft shop with lots of lovely bolt ends and made duvet covers, and curtains for her and her son's bedrooms and the living room. Then I crocheted a huge afghan to cover the 4 seater orange couch. I used to sleep on it with the cat on my head. She got tulips in pinks and yellows on a blue background, grandson got teddy bears, and the living room got a blues, greens and yellows. You can make a big difference to a place with a bit of fabric and a sewing machine. I think it was my last major sewing effort.

The tablecloth I never finished was Richelieu embroidery - cut work. It was too much effort I guess.

nacy - mother in her late 80s knitted us all large colourful scarves. They were beautiful combinations of colours and large enough to be very warm. I think anyone who came into her flat got a scarf. lol. Being mother, she became quite obsessive about the knitting, No fancy stiches, just plain knitting and great colours.

Just don't give me those crocheted dish rags. I hate them!
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Ana, I’m pretty rusty now but I used to be a sewing whiz. I started very young with doll clothes and kept at it for years. Formal wear was my favorite, evening gowns, fancy cocktail dresses, sequins and bugle beads and seed pearls, Oh My! Probably making up for the fact that I wasn’t born a princess. Always Halloween costumes, of course….such fun!

Golden, I went through the trapunto stage too but never to the point of doing a whole quilt! That is extremely impressive, especially on satin, which slides all over itself.
I think I’ve tried every needle technique known to man over the years. I would get to the point where I could produce something either useful or beautiful, then give it as a gift and move on to something else. Dress making and tailoring lasted the longest out of necessity until it got more expensive to make clothes than buy them.
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Peasuep, yeah I remember the candles on the mantel for sure. Actually I still use the silver tinsels. It just isn't Christmas without it.

Golden I love crafts, just not as very great at it. So too years ago I taught myself how to knit, or tried to, through YouTube Got good at the main stich , made two scarfs , so yesterday I pulled them out, put the tassel on them. When it got to the other stitches, knit one purel 2 stuff I got tired, but I think I'll practice some more now. There is so much to learn, reading patterns and the terms, like gauge and all that.
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Bringing back some great memories here, I sewed and knitted and crocheted and embroidered,,,Mother and her grandmother before her were great seamstresses, as is my dd, She once free hand embroidered a mountain range on the back of a jean jacket - could have sold it for $100s.

In Scotland you could buy kits of wonderful woolen fabric for a skirt and matching yarn to knit a sweater. In the Montreal years when I was young and free I made my wardrobe. It was a very fashionable city but I couldn't afford to buy so I sewed. Later, I made a few outfits for myself and my dd but life got too busy,

I remember making a quilt for my first grandchild. I had always been fascinated by trapunto embroidery, so I designed and made a pale blue satin quilt with trapunto embroidery.

Of course, there were lots of afghans crocheted over the years, sweaters for my boys...laterly baby outfits that I gave away to the thrift shop. Knitting and crocheting are very peaceful activities. You only have to think of the next stitch.

And Halloween outfits. I was so glad when dd took over that job,

Christmas decorations and the tinsel that the cat ate - always. Dd had one cat that ate Christmas tree light bulbs - didn't swallow them, just crunched them.
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Wow Peasuep, you must have tremendous sewing skills! I only sew very simple things. Lots of Hallowe’en costumes over the years. (3 kids) Lots of mending.
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My car took me to HomeGoods yesterday .
Yes , I’m blaming it on the car .

I don’t go often because I like it too much .
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Nacy, OF COURSE Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas without a silly candle! You’re younger than I am but do you remember the little choir girl and boy candles you would line upon the mantle? (Nobody burned them, otherwise they would be headless.)
How about that icky fiberglass Angel Hair snow stuff that would cut you if you handled it wrong? Or the white sheet batting with multicolored glitter that you would wrap around the tree stand to hide it. Or that metallic plastic tinsel that the cat would pull off the tree and eat like spaghetti?
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Ana, I used to sew all my own and my girl’s dresses….all the way up to their wedding dresses. Then I stopped cold. It got too expensive and now JoAnn’s is 3/4 fleece! Now if I wanted to make a dress I’d have to shop on line and I hate that. If I can’t feel the material and see the drape and flow how can I know if it will work? I do like JoAnn’s for craft materials and notions and seasonal decorations.
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I should be banned from fabric stores until all the material I couldn’t resist buying is finally sewn. I am often seduced by garden centres, craft, and hardware stores as well. How likely will I finish my Christmas gift sewing project? Or will my daughter receive it for her birthday next autumn? I suspect we all know. 🤦🏼‍♀️
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Eva, Michaels, was right next to moms eye glass place, and was calling to us. 😂 Ive got like 5 projects home that is for someday? So I'm really trying to advoid that stuff. I did get some Christmas decorations, that I certainly didn't need either, things I just couldn't refuse. Everyone needs candles shaped like a Christmas tree , with gum drops all over it. 😆. Now we gotta go back to pick her new glasses up, in a couple weeks.

Peasuep, I think golden has a wild fire story too. If my memory is right?
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Macy,
Micheals is caregiver’s heaven for crafts. I restrain myself and have not gone for over a year. Should do it and resume some hobbies.
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Thanks, Psue. Lots of challenges for sure.
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Costco is my kryptonite. I've taken to going in without the cart.
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Golden, it would be tedious to read about a life that was only good or only bad. I think your life, what little I’ve heard about it, sounds fascinating.
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As is JoAnn’s!
And Home Depot!
And any and all garden centers!
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"Michael"s" a very dangerous store, to your wallet
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Peasuep, I think the owls eat the gizzards of some animals. Hubby found a house cat of someones, at his family farm, with nothing but the insides missing, we suspected an owl
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Margaret, I live in Canada and we can purchase roo for both human and pet consumption. It is not common.

Peasuep, the proposed cull of barred owls is sad but I can appreciate the need to save spotted owls, What an awful decision to have to make.
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Had jugged hare many years ago in the UK. It was good!

Life in Northern Alberta can be interesting. Got moose blood on the ceiling once when we butchered a moose in the kitchen. I had photos of the process - no idea where they are now. Moose rib cage is huge,

Both ex and R hunted and butchered. Ex was Cree - native Canadian so we had access to caribou. I actually saw a herd on the edge of town up north once.

My life has had many phases, psue - some better than others.
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