Pam celebrated a significant birthday this week. It was the highlight of an otherwise normal fall week. Leaf pickup and a few small pre-winter prep tasks took up some time as well.
Pam’s November birthday was celebrated over the course of two days. Day One we ordered Chinese take-out from The Lucky Bamboo restaurant in New Hampton, a treat for us. The next day Becky brought a few gifts and a cake to contribute to a second day of celebration.
Gifts included clothing, McVitties digestive biscuits, books, and a commemorative blanket from my sister Kitt. The steak and kidney pies I ordered were delayed in shipment and are still to be received. (I suspect they have to come all the way from England and may take a while to get here.) Pam enjoyed the cards, gifts and phone calls.
A few other tasks took up some of my time. While our oak trees are pretty leafless now, the neighboring maple trees are at the height of dropping their leaves, which blow onto our yard. A layer of leaves gets deposited every time the wind blows. Between the lawn vacuum and the John Deere rider with bagger, I took 4 trailer loads of leaves to the compost site this week. Leaf pickup will continue until snow’s on the ground (preferably no snow til late December!).
Pam has begun work on her Winter Solstice cards, creating a theme and getting artwork off the web. I help by resizing graphic files and creating print-outs of the selected artwork. There is a lot of detail involved in creating these cards. The deadline for getting them in the mail approaches quickly; Pam is putting in many hours of work on this project.
We continue looking for a replacement vehicle — in person at a dealership, online auto sites and via auction. The front runner at present is the [EX trim level] Kia Soul, as it adds many of the features I want, particularly heated seats. Pam thinks the adjustability of the power seats and steering wheel will be helpful; they can be moved up and and down and forward and back, tailoring a very comfortable seating position for her shorter height.
By the way, the “IVT” in the above titles stands for “Intelligent Variable Transmission,” which is a type of CVT automatic transmission. A CVT delivers seamless acceleration without interruption for gear shifts. Instead of fixed gears, it uses a pair of variable-width pulleys connected by a flexible belt. One pulley is attached to the engine and the other to the axle shafts.
Another small project took up a bit of my time, building a couple suet feeder hangers. NE Iowa should experience a mild spell this coming week, with temps topping out near 60 degrees. Too warm to put out suet or bird seed yet. Hopefully this mild weather will stick around until we decorate Heart House for the annual holiday parade three weeks from now.
That’s it for now. Thanks for looking in!
Pam’s Penny
A significant birthday ending in “0” is now in the rear view mirror. Pondering the next decade; the last decade was action-packed with retirement, social security/ Medicare, relocation and home renovation. Looking forward — ???
Seems strange not having a list of outdoor activities and projects to do. With the digging in of tulip bulbs and construction of anti-deer enclosures for new trees, yard work is a wrap for the year. Ah well, plenty of activity keeping the “kitten nursery plus dog nursing home” going indoors.
As noted above, holiday cards have moved from design to implementation. All ordered supplies have been received. Time for me to get into my cut-and-paste happy place.
Happy Trails.
Leave a Reply