Random Thoughts

Last of the Autumn Colors

It's hard to believe but the 'holiday season' is upon us. For the last couple of years the powers that be where I work have given us an extra day off at Thanksgiving. So now we get Wednesday, Thursday and Friday off. With the weekend that makes a nice long mini-vacation. I'm not into any suicidal shopping missions, so I normally take the time to finish things up for the winter and just stay at home. Saturday I will be taking Mr. Griffin and Mist home and picking up my three girls from Allena. So far Griff has been very mild mannered and not caused any problems, so hopefully he will behave the next several days. Some of the little weanling ewes are starting to cycle and I hope he doesn't figure out just how to escape and get in with them. He has been in with the ewes since October 9th so I'm ready to pull him out and get the girls all back together. Makes chores easier and they are more content when they are back with the flock.

It has been a very rough week here. My lovely young cousin David died in a car accident a year ago this past week, leaving behind a wife and two small children. My thoughts have been heavy thinking of him and his family. David loved the Lord, so I know he is safe and happy, but the sadness for those he left behind is still painful. It grieves my heart when I think of them.

Then the week ended with the death of beautiful little Ringo. For those of you who don't remember Ringo he was the lovely little wether that I decided to keep even against my 'not keeping another wether rule'. He was exceptionally friendly and sweet with personality plus. He went with me to the Celtic Festival. I will post about this some other time, as I can't really talk about it just yet. He died of pneumonia, despite aggressive treatment.

On a brighter note, I wanted to share with you, what I found at a local flea market. It has a bit of a story behind it, but recently Kathy ("Look What Followed Me Home") did a post about a wheel she found for $50.00. I must say I was a bit envious and maybe a tad bitter that she had found such a marvelous deal!Several months ago, my sister and my niece and I went on a little early morning jaunt. (As a side note, and totally unrelated to this story, I just want to say that I will never make the mistake again, of accidentally getting between my niece and a "Prada" box at a thrift store! Alas, it was only the box, but I did have a brief moment of fear when I saw her eyes zoom in on it.) We ate breakfast out, and then went to several thrift stores and a flea market. The flea market was the last stop of the morning, and the minute we walked in I spotted 'it'. I quickly walked over to check the Spinning Wheel out. Price tag first of course! It was marked at $155.00. I'm sure. I had both my sister and niece look at it (and the price) and my niece even took pictures with her cell phone for me. (although we could never figure out how to load them on the Internet) It seemed like a decent price, but it also had several parts that had been replaced, and what did I know about wheels anyway? I've been wanting one for awhile, but I did not want to pay allot of cash and then end up not using it. So I didn't buy it, but I thought I would email the pix to Allena and see what she thought. That didn't work, but Allena thought that was a good price for a wheel. We even talked about going down there sometime and looking at it, but never got around to it. Fast forward a couple months to a few weeks ago. I was in the vicinity again and decided to go thru the flea market, doing a little Christmas shopping (most of my family likes some sort of collectibles). When I walked in 'it' was still there. I walked over to it, and of course checked the price again. After all, maybe it had miraculously reduced itself. I looked. Looked again. Whoa Nelly! That can't be right! It had $55.00 marked on the price tag! FIFTY-FIVE not a ONE HUNDRED FIFTY FIVE. Huh. Because I'm not very spontaneous (thinking about it for two months at $155.00 doesn't count), I had to go thru the entire market deciding if I should buy it. I finally decided that I would be an idiot if I didn't, so I scooped it up and went to the checkout. I came home with my very first Spinning Wheel that day. My first thoughts were they had miss priced it--I mean coming down $100.00 seems pretty excessive. Using our best CSI skills my niece and I looked through the pictures (which were still on her phone) and discovered the old tag had been white and the new tag was orange. So who knows. I'm happy though. Saturday when I take the ram back I'm taking the wheel too, and Allena can tell me if it is going to be use-able. It seems to have the right parts, but beyond that I don't know. Hopefully she can show me how to 'load it up' (technical spinning term--not...). I'll keep you posted. In the meantime, there is something very soothing about just seeing it sitting there. Go figure.

Lastly I wanted to share a picture of my little buddy, Meshach. He is constantly about my business and when the day is done, he plants his furry little body as close to my head as possible. Another day done well, he seems to sigh.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. Count your blessings, love your family and your friends (two and four legged). Take the moments to let them know you care about them. Don't put it off. Cherish those moments.