THE ONLY PROBLEM WITH LAP ROBES...

is that they only cover one's lap!

Thankfully, today we're finally blessed with a day that began with temps above freezing!
 

GREETINGS FROM ATOP DAREDEVIL HILL

 
We're getting pretty good at handling all these "Jammie Days" we're being gifted with this year. Yesterday's came with rain and ice, so we couldn't have left home even if we'd wanted to. Believe me, we didn't.

Now Hubby is reading Origin, and I've moved on to The Fifth Season.

The Best Lap Blankets Ever Invented

Just swish the plunger up and down a few times for a nice head of foam on the milky beverage of your choice.

This morning it's only 16 F out, but this afternoon we should get about six hours of full sun, with temperatures slightly above freezing. Hopefully, that will be enough to clear our driveway of ice. Temps will go right back to being frigid after that brief reprieve, but at least we will no longer be housebound, and perhaps the FedEx truck will be able to make it up the hill with our Blue Apron delivery, which was supposed to arrive yesterday. Then we can make it into town to stock up on more logs! 

Know what's really bizarre? In just a few days we will be back up around 70 F, and I'll be wearing my flip-flops again.

Texas. Gotta love crazy to live here! 

OUR FORGETFUL ELF STRIKES AGAIN

Believe it or not, my hubby was actually a bit of a Grinch before I met him. But, then I introduced him to The Thomas Way of doing Christmas. He was especially impressed by the fact that, in my family, you were never too old for a fully-stuffed stocking! Eventually, that became his "thing", and before we knew it, he'd begin hoarding stuffers mid-summer and, come Christmas, he was adding goodies to any stocking within shouting distance. In fact, he was stashing so very many stuffers that he was having trouble remembering what all he had and where it was hidden. Inevitably, sometime in January, or even later, he'd come out wagging something in his hand, saying "You'll never guess what I just found!" In fact, it became so routine that the kids and I began taking bets on when it would happen, and who it would be for. This year I was the lucky recipient! Just the other day he came into the bathroom where I was putting on my makeup, and plopped this down in front of me, saying "Guess what I had 'squirreled away' downstairs!"

I just about dropped my teeth. I've been wanting a good squirrel watercolor mop ever since I started taking on-line classes with Junelle Jacobsen and saw her using one. But, every time I started to buy one, I'd chicken out. They're expensive. And here he'd bought me a whole set, complete with a bamboo roll-up holder, then managed to forget all about it!

So, between those and my new set of really-good Windsor & Newton watercolors, purchased with a couple of gift certificates from the kids, I feel I really must get back to painting! A couple of years ago -- back before I got distracted by weddings and travel journals and collage and paper-painting and grandbabies -- I was having a lot of fun with my then-new Creative Girl workbook by Danielle Donaldson.

I'm thinking it's really time I got back to that. Don't you agree?