What Child is This .....

Elizabeth Orton Jones illustrator and author of
1940's children's books,   A Little Child, and 
Small Rain.  

Play Rummy.

A CONNECT:  A GOOD GAME OF Rummy. 

 

As kids and with our kids, we played rummy.  

These days, my husband and I  play Rummy with my sister-in-law Sweet Sue.  She has MS, and short term memory loss,  but even over the years as her MS limitations continue, she shuffles and deals,  scoops up the cards, makes points, and often wins.    

It's  a great way to connect - We have fun. We try to win as we banter back and forth, and pass the snacks and razz a little…  "Hey, are  you cheating?  Whose deal is it?"  A Nudge - whose turn is it?  It’s okay to forget, because we’re all getting older!   

And like how it is, our lives over the last seventy years, we play the hand we're dealt and  focus on that.  We’ve learned a lot, and the rules have stayed with us:  No one can play our cards for us, and no one can play their hand over again. Of course play to win! It’s more fun.  Healthy competition. No two hands are dealt the same.    And no one  wins every hand.

 

Connect:  And oh, my take on   HEARING AIDS.  

    Ida, is 91 and has just received ,  her first pair  ever - of much needed hearing aids. 

     She can  hardly hear a thing,  and yet she is a social butterfly.  When it comes to conversation,  she wings it!

     When the hearing aid guy plugged her in, she lit up!   Her demeanor changed, and  voice softened.  She could hear her own voice again...and so, leaned into a quieter  conversation, with  a peaceful  look on her face. But when she entered a room with a lot of people and conversation, that changed it a bit, and the hearing aids needed to be adjusted.   

     I think back to her own mother who lost her hearing early - but  who in her mid 90's was still up and at 'em,  in the garden,  pulling weeds,  and planting new tulip and  daffodils bulbs, and all summer long,  wanting to be in her garden.    

     Over the years, she stopped talking altogether, because she couldn't hear.  I can see her still,  standing in the midst of planted things looking at us, but not reaching out to us like she once did, as if there was a fence between us.  But we reach out for a connect -  a hug or two,  as  she shows us her  latest flowers in bloom.  

    

Barbie Doll Crochet

The toy department at the Farm and Garden Store has opened for the Christmas season.    A wispy little girl who said she was age 4, was at the counter with her mother buying a Barbie Doll.  The Barbie  looked much like the dolls I was buying for my girls in the 1980's. Blonde hair, skinny waist, and long legs.   Their tiny fashion outfits not all that easy to sew. 

   Some things old are still new.  To sew and crochet. Crafting Christmas gifts- a part of homemaking.  

 

   McCalls and Family Circle magazine in the 80's published patterns for  knitting and crocheting Barbie doll sweaters.

 ... an old fashioned Christmas this year for the  knitting and crocheting grandmothers out there?  (Posted before seeing the new Barbie movie! I think yarn colors would all need to be sparkly  pink for this day and age.  )  

 

                                            Barbie Doll Crochet and Knitting.

 

Chrystal Beads

Christmas Ornaments handcrafted  at the dining room table in the 1980's on  cold frosty weekends.  With the girls,  during their grade school days.

  In a little western town in Montana  on Main street, in the 1990's,  (a block away from the saddle shop)   there was  a store  that sold mostly plastic beads.   Alvira was the shop owner, designer, and retailer.  

She put   together   kits of beads -  angels, candy canes,  snowflakes, and wreaths for others to make.   Many were sent to rec centers in retirement communities in Arizona.  These were  simple and inexpensive.  

Part of her advertising strategy was a booklet of her bead ornament designs  hand drawn  in black and white,  by  my daughter, a  young graphic art student at the time.  She made beads sparkle  on paper with  faceted lines.  

In 2022, In New York ... in a retail shop  filled with  designer purses,  jewelry, and even dog collars.    Sparkly beads.   The latest trends in fashion “discovered…”.

I think I need a  few  packages of  plastic sparkly  beads this year for a bit of nostalgia - crystal clear,  red, gold, and green. 

Hand made in the 1980's:
  Angel ornaments
of sparkly crystal
 plastic beads

In 2022, Selling in a dazzling shop in New York, 

 dog collars,  purses, and earrings  

made of sparkly crystal plastic beads on 33 Orchard Street. 

  

Turkey Activity

 This is a Thanksgiving turkey activity and decoration used by my favorite COTA ~   Certified Occupational Therapy Assistant, who has worked  at a long term care center.  

ACTIVIY: Button and unbutton colorful turkey feathers onto the turkey body. 

 putting the resident’s hands  into motion! 

              Make  the  turkey before hand:  Use Light color felt,  and  cut a pear shape body.  

Sew the PEAR shape onto a  darker color felt  shape  that has been cut out with  the outline of a turkey back - a solid silhouette  of  feathers.  

(Cut the back piece large enough to sew on colorful buttons.)  

     Make a  large   variety of  colored  feathers with  slits for buttonholes in them to  button and unbutton.   

     Paint,  or cut out felt feet, and face pieces to attach with glue or stitching.

  

Have participants button on the feathers!   Happy Thanksgiving! 

Fall Colors

Hollyhock Junction  where lakes woodlands and prairie meet.  

Out for a ride today to enjoy the fall colors
 and the change of seasons.

 

Potato Days

Potato Days Festival ...

 

Think Mashed Potatoes

Just miles from here, there are potatoes growing in  some of the best farmland anywhere. And the summer celebration is Potato Days activities and contests...  potato picking ,  Lefse making, and the potato sack fashion show.      

Nutrient "wise", one medium baked potato has:

Vitamin C:  28% of the RDI: (That’s a good thing- there are no orange groves this far north!)   

And Vitamin B6, 27% of the RDI,   Potassium 26%, Magnesium 12%, Manganese 19%,  Phosphorus 12%, Niacin 12%, and Folate 12%.

Protein: 4.3 grams,  Fat. 0.2 grams, 161 calories. 

And yes, Carbs - there are 36.6 grams.  Keeps you warm in the winter time this far north. 

Also may improve the digestive health. May improve blood sugar control,  Contains antioxidants and flavonoids.  

And a five pound bag of potatoes is still pretty inexpensive! 

I like potatoes in every way - baked, mashed, cottage fried,  French fried, potato salad, and escalloped. Oh and potato soup with - kid’s choice - a few 1/4” slices of hotdog added…in the days of making a budget stretch.   

  Proverbs 31: 14  She brings her food from afar...

Hollyhockjunction.blogspot.com

Story and Books

     

 There are a few projects on my kitchen table where the light is best, as is the view from here, where lakes, woodlands and prairie meet. Everyday meaningful life is in progress.       

The coffee pot is on and I appreciate the stories  that are told by family and friends from many walks of life,  including several  health care givers.  (There are old folks among us.) Of course, names have been changed. 

I have   time to write - creative thought,  and to tie together quotes,  a turn of phrase, photos, scripture, and poetic prose.   Putting together a book?  

I get up and stretch - writers get stiff,  and I  meander to the garden where the Hollyhocks and Zinnias are in bloom.  

The reason I'm not open to comments is because I'm a techy dinosaur and prefer to keep it uncomplicated.  

Yesterday my daughter in the city said,  "Small bookstores are coming back."  

I have always said,  "There's a comfort in holding what you read.  Hello good book."  

Rewind

 January is the month to reorganize and put everything into clear plastic containers.  If I see it I can find it.

   I ought to round up the family photos and images that are in  albums, on reels, slides, cartridges, disks, cd's and in cyber space on I Cloud.  Then I could put them within easy reach.  Keeping track,  just in case the kids are home and want to look back. I admit last summer they were too busy swimming. 

    So hey you guys, what about all the photos we took?    I have them on flash-I'm trying my best to function in the 21st century.

   Reel to real. I think about an old yellowed photograph that I can't find. The family is in Gram's living room.  There's a white sheet hanging on her cedar log wall. My young nephew is helping Grandpa thread the reel on a very old Bell and Howell  35 mm projector.  It's a three minute clip of Grandpa's 1940's Canadian fishing trip - talkless men smiling and walking around with a string of big Northerns.  

   The reel spins again with a a clickity clack as the light flashes, and then snap, snap, snap!  That's the end of it.  "Turn on the light," Grandpa calls.  There's a steady hum as the reel runs backwards for the rewind. A short intermission.  To the kitchen for milk and  cookies.  Instead, my  nephew studies the mechanics of how the reel goes around, and says,  "Somebody turn off the lights, this one's of my Mom sliding down a twelve foot snow bank, and it's got Grandma and Grandpa in it ice skating on the river...roll em!"

   Tawnia  interjects,  (by way of a text after reading this post:)  That someone was me who was sitting next to the cookie jar and turning on the light."   

And later Tamara adds:  "I like curling up on the sofa chair with the pics that are  stored in old shoe boxes.  Hands on.”

hollyhockjunction.blogspot.com

Books to find.

 I like vintage children's books.  Most often they are found on the shelves of the new old library - on  the back wall of thrift shops, or on  Ebay.

But also!  New large activity-friendly library  buildings are popping up in several nearby towns.  Libraries   integrating activities,  interactive story telling, crafts, seminars,  art projects, and authors presenting the books they’ve written.

 

One new library  is replacing a "center of town" mall,  where once upon a time, the main activity was shopping.   And there’s the book mobile, and little free library stations  found in many unusual places.  

 

 

Cothing Store

      On front street in a near by town,  there is a brick and mortar clothing store.     My mother's favorite.  The hooks and hangers are filled with a variety of sweaters, jackets and scarves, even though Christmas and the holidays are long over.  

     Two clerks offer assistance.  One,  I think is the manager/owner.   "What can we do for these people?"  She asks, speaking out at the isles that have very few customers in them.  "Forty percent off on sweaters."  She adds.  

     "The sweater coats, too?"  My mother asks.

     "All of the sweaters, and fifty percent off  scarves and hats."

     I look at them. Scarves on shelves tucked in places all over the store. They're beautiful, and good quality, with plenty to pick from.  I should buy several to give as gifts next year.  

     But haven't I decided that gift giving is a bust?  My family has their own likes, loves, colors, textures, looks!  Who can figure it out.  Not me.  Not me the not-a-decision maker person. 

     I know there is high fashion, as in  New York school of Fashion and Design, and fast fashion-  the youthful college independence- cool and  unique clothing  found at thrift shops.   And there is even slow fashion...sewn by hand.  

     Mother buys what she likes.  Most always it's striking. 

   She picks out a sweater and a sweater coat, and disappears into a dressing room.  She steps out in a red and black rose patterned top  with unusually wide three quarter sleeves.  I like the drama, and it  has a nice fit.     

     She decides on it, as well as  an  off white  embroidered sweater coat she chooses for spring.   

     While she stands at the  checkout counter with the clerk, the manager makes her way over to me, and asks if I walk? (Is she looking at my  grungy tennis shoes with good winter tread?)   She thrusts towards me a fluffy beanie hat.  

     "This is probably the warmest hat you will ever find." she says.   "It's  cable knit,  and lined in fleece.  You won't get cold walking in this hat."

     I take it in my hand and examine it.  I ask,  "But is it too tight,  or itchy?" And is it the right color for me?"