Termite Tenting Reprieve Buuut...

My cousin, Arnold offered to have us stay at his house whenever we'd have to get our house tented for lurking termites who could be munching away at the house. And my blogger buddy, Honolulu Aunty also offered us a place to stay. 

For people on the mainland or anywhere else you are blessed with not having termites, let me explain. Whenever a home is thought to be infested with termites, a company can come and put a colorful tent over and around your entire house. A poisonous gas called Vikane is pumped into the tent to kill all the termites and some other bug that is within that tent. All food items will need to be bagged, including what you have in your fridge. And of course, you need to find somewhere else to stay while this is being done.

However, just as I was resigned to this eventuality, our friend, Terry told me about the termite inspector she uses from Aloha Termite and Pest Control. She said whenever they suspect a termite lurking, they call Stacy Hirota. I liked her even more when she told me she was once a teacher too.

When Art returned with my brother from the Aloha Termite fumigation vault with our cabinet we saw a lot of teeny tiny termites that had been trying to escape the gas in the wood. I sort of, almost felt sorry for them.

I texted Stacy and she came a couple of days later.

Stacy inspected the cabinet we'd already taken to the fumigation vault and the support beams of the house next to the cabinet where I thought there were more termites. She said we were safe. She really didn't feel there were termites there and said tenting was unnecessary. She also advised us to bang on the fumigated cabinet a few times to dislodge any more poop that might be there so that we don't get spooked if more droppings are seen. (As you can see, the kitchen, dining room and living room was in complete disorder.)

However...

Of course there's a however. She said we should try to paint whatever naked wood we see at the back of the cabinet (including the cabinet right behind the infested one) and caulk the cracks and holes where termites can crawl in. Those termites are very teeny. It only takes two to start a colony according to Stacy. I even had to caulk the extra shelving holes.

Well gosh darn! There's a LOT of holes and cracks. And then there's the sides, backs and underneath the shelves and drawers. Arrghh!

Stacy also confirmed that it was drywood termites that were feasting on our cabinets. Drywood termites eat rather slowly. The real danger, she said, are ground termites because they eat a LOT and quickly. Ground termites search for water and wood. Drywood termites don't need water to survive. Therefore, it's not good to plant a lot of things close to your house where you would be watering it. Termites will sniff that out and then eat your house for dessert. I have since heard lots of horror stories from friends and relatives. 

Stacy recommended we have the perimeter of our house treated with Termidor to kill ground termites that come into contact with it. You could tell Stacy was once a teacher. She had a folder full of information to teach us all we needed to know about termites.

So yes...

I caulked all the holes we could see in the cabinet and Art painted the naked unfinished wood. 

It took us several days and it was a misery having dishes, cups, mugs, bowls, blenders, coffee makers, rice cookers, etc. all around the rest of the house while hoping I would remember where I put them. 

But then there's the rest of the cabinets in the kitchen where Stacy said it would be a good idea to caulk the holes we won't be using.

Sigh...

And it took a whole day to get the cabinet back in place with the help of our neighbor. Now there's just the mouldings to reinstall and we'll be done.

This has been our lives this month. My friend, Cloudia recently said, "There is more drama here than in many Korean soaps!"  😂

I'm afraid so.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to Everybody who celebrates this fun holiday!

It's rather hectic at our house because of all the termite madness which caused our holiday preparations to be delayed.

I haven't been able to get on the computer to visit you for the past couple of weeks, but hope you're having a fun, joyous day.

Art will be busy doing his volunteer work delivering meals (Meals on Wheels) to all his "clients." 😄

And we're having a Popeye's chicken lunch for mom just for fun. Apparently they have KFC in Japan at Christmas so we thought we'd sort of copy them. The kids have sent mom a lot of gifts so it will be a lot of fun.

So on this Christmas Day, I'm looking back at this photo from 1980 when we lived in Chicago and friends had surprised us with a giant real live tree for the kids to enjoy.

It was a happy time. And it's making me smile. I'm wishing you all a lot of smiles today.

Terrible Termite Trouble! Arrrgghh!!!

I wrote earlier about the very unpleasant surprise we found when preparing for our belated Thanksgiving Dinner on December 2nd.

When people in Hawaii see those little termite poop, it sends a cold shiver down our entire body. Our brain is disbelieving at first. 

"Why me?" "Why now?" "Is it a Ground 😫 Termite?" "Is it a Drywood 😩Termite?" "Will the house have to be tented?" Where will we stay while it's being tented?"  "How did the termite get in?" 

At first, we thought the termites were only in the cabinet door.

Could we be that lucky? So we took off the door we thought might be infested. 

Nope! Not lucky.

I'd put white paper under where we saw that first poop and there was still poop the following morning.

And more poop the  morning after that. 

I thought Drywood Termites ate slowly. Why are they pooping so much?

Now we (me) were really freaking out.

Art even went to Home Depot to get extra large plastic bags to enclose all the doors and drawers so whatever termites were lurking in them wouldn't move to some other part of the house. Yes, we were paranoid.

We called Aloha Termite and Pest Control who sent over an estimator who told us we could avoid tenting the house and just bring the cabinet over to their fumigation vault. It would cost about $400.

We asked our neighbor for help in loading the 8 foot cabinet into our van. I was sure it wouldn't fit.

"Don't worry..." said Art. "It will fit. I measured it. So it will probably fit. Maybe."

But incredibly, it did.

Our friend, Dave came to help Art drive it to Aloha Termite and Pest Control's Fumigation Vault.

My brother came the next morning to help pick up the fumigated cabinet pieces and we saw a lot of teeny tiny termites. They were still attached to the cabinet here and there where they died after a desperate attempt to escape the fumes.

I thought our troubles were over.

I HOPED our termite troubles were over.

Arrrghhh!

However, I found more termite poop near one of the house support beams close to where the cabinet was located.

We've got another termite inspector coming and we already know what she'll be telling us.

Sigh... That we’re going to have to tent the house and everybody has told me what a headache that is. They say all your food has to be bagged, even things in your refrigerator. You have to stay at a hotel, relative's or friend’s home. And so on and so forth.

I did not need this to add to the stress of the holiday season.

Arrrghhhhhhh!

Glider Spider

This is just a silly post.

I don't like spiders. They have creeped me out since I was little. We had creepy garden spiders that I won't even show you because it will creep me out to look at my post. I hated the giant cane spiders that were about 5 feet across. Just kidding. They were more like 3 inches wide, but they would sit on the wall until you came into the room and then go skittering here or there... I never knew which way they'd go. 

Once, I walked into my bedroom in our sugar plantation camp house and a giant cane spider fell on me and seemed to run around my muumuu before I screamed, shook and made it fall to the floor. I yelled at my brother to do something but it turned out that he didn't like them either.

Anyway, I don't like spiders.

However, the other day Art noticed something he just had to show me.

If you can't see this, you can click on the photo to enlarge it.

This tiny spider had glided all the way from Art's forgotten bonsai tree to mom's overgrown orchid plant with a little help from the wind.

I have got to give this little spider props 👏 for courage and determination.

But I still don't like spiders.

Cleaning Up for the New Year

I know it's something I grew up with that mom ingrained into my subconscious. We always did our "spring cleaning" before New Years Day. It was the idea that we must go into the New Year with a clean slate. We pay off our bills, get rid of garbage, finish our thank you notes and obligations, clean up holiday decorations (we try), organize whatever needs organizing and clean everything.  

I started in November. (Mainly because Art has needed my computer to work on his African Safari photobook.) 

I first got our New Year Newsletters done and printed. Then I cleaned and organized the drawers in the kitchen. They were a MESS! There are certain members in our family who tends to drop things in drawers helter skelter and it's not me.

I should have taken a BEFORE and AFTER photo but once I got going, I couldn't stop. Please imagine that drawer with the tags and clips just one big junk pile. The other drawers were no better.

I just got this AI generated photo with the help of Ed from Riverbend Journal. OK, maybe it wasn't this bad, but close.

I now often open the drawers just to feel the satisfaction of having order again.

I donated old dishes and kitchen supplies to the temple rummage sale, gave away toys from the toy closet (grandkids are either grown up or in South Asia), and so on and so forth. 

(The Japanese signs are used to remind mom what we are doing if we're out of the house. Her forgetfulness is becoming more acute these days.)

I went through my bookshelves filled with all the books I'd collected and bought from rummage and library sales for my 1st grade classroom. 

I sent several large flat rate boxes of books to our grandsons in South Asia where English books are much needed and saved the rest to give away at our family get-together.

Then I moved to my office.

We keep receiving tons of greeting cards that we don't use from charities for donations we've given. Art even asked some of them to stop but it didn't do any good. 

Art hates to throw away things that MIGHT be used so he started putting them in my drawers. His drawers are too full. So I went through the pile that was stuffed in my drawer and ruthlessly tossed a bunch of them away. I kept the envelopes because .... well... who knows? I might be able to use them. Maybe. And then I told Art he was no longer allowed to put any more cards or anything else in my drawers. 😐

Two of my friends tell me they are also downsizing and organizing their households. In fact, they started a year or two ago. I guess it's partly because of our age. Do we really want to leave all this for our kids to have to deal with? 

When I did some organizing last November/December I put this dress in the donation box. Later, with a change of heart, I searched frantically for it.

I've written about how our son was born in the military hospital elevator in Illinois and how Art had been the one to deliver his son by himself. Well, this is the dress I was wearing at the time.

OK... I'm going to look at the closets now to see what I can take out for donation or trash... carefully.

I think I might be making Art nervous. 😏

When Life Doesn't Give You Lemons, Would an Orchid Do?

I wrote a post in 2015 called Art's Lemon Tree Grove. We had tasted Art's sister's Meyer lemons in California when we visited her in 2013. She and my brother-in-law are avid gardeners. We could not believe how sweet the lemons were. They tasted like sweet lemon juice without any tartness at all.

Well... she sent us a lot of seeds from her tree that Art promptly planted.

We ended up with quite a few lemon seedlings that Art even shared with friends.

Oops!

The ones he kept grew and grew and grew. 

But there were no lemons.

There were just huge, dangerous thorns which I would occasionally cut off.

When we researched how to propagate trees, we learned TOO LATE that you can't get the same sort of fruit from seeds.

You have to GRAFT them from the original tree. 😖

So now we had these trees and they kept growing. I kept telling Art that he needed to get rid of them. 

But now they were like his babies and he just couldn't kill them.

Eventually, the pots started to crack and weeds joined the huge, thorny trees. He even transplanted a couple of the lemon trees into new pots until I finally told him they just had to go.

So last month... finally... after ten years and more persistent nagging discussion, he said goodbye to his overgrown ugly not pretty lemon trees after I cut the tops off. 

Yes, I did warn him that I would before I did it. The pots were so brittle from the Hawaiian sun that much of it just cracked off. There wasn't a lot of dirt left in the pot.

However...

There were these plants (weeds) that had attached itself to the lemon trees' roots.

My brother, Dennis had taken a photo of one of the flowers from the weeds a while ago.

It looked like an orchid, but could they grow in really old yukky dirt?

Dennis said it was a common wild ground orchid and that we should just discard it because you can find them growing wild all over the island.

And did he discard the ground orchid weed? Nope, just transplanted them to this pot.

And do you think he tossed ALL the non-producing rather unsightly lemon trees? Sigh... Nope.

He said he liked the bonsai like roots at the bottom of the lemon tree. And wouldn't you know that even though I'd trimmed off the top branches, there were more shoots coming up at the top and the bottom.

Ah well... I give up.

Traveling Grandsons

My husband, Art and his sister have been fearless travelers since a young age. Their dad actually traveled from the wilds of early Hawaii to Wisconsin's School of Engineering in1929, but wasn't able to graduate because he had to return home to recover when one of his kidneys had to be removed.

When she grew up, Art's sister flew to Muncie, Indiana's Ball State and completed her teaching degree. Art went to Peoria, Illinois' Bradley University and was able to complete his electrical engineering degree. I imagine that really made his dad happy too.

I did not venture to the mainland until I married Art and moved to Illinois in 1974 because he accepted a position there with the U.S.E.P.A. 

And here I thought I was brave to move from our sleepy sugar cane plantation village in Waipahu to the University of Hawaii dormitory on the Manoa campus which is 15 miles away (but took about an hour and a half to get home on the bus).

I should have known from the start of our marriage that my life would now be totally different. Art was in the Air Force for 6 years after graduation so he'd been everywhere and he had places he wanted to see. So we did visit areas around Illinois and on to the west and east coast. 

When our children were born, he wanted to show them different parts of the country so that's what we did. And when they were older, he decided that we should show them other parts of the world. So we did.

Was I nervous? Yup. But I understood it was a good idea to give the kids a world view.

Our son-in-law did propose to Tiffany at the Borghese Gardens in Rome.

Keola joined the Peace Corps where he met his future adventurous wife in Mali, West Africa.

They now live in South Asia and take our grandsons to other countries. Here they are in Malaysia.

They also sent us photos from Singapore.

OK, this photo startled me at first, but I know Keola was a lifeguard and avid surfer. Sarah is a very cautious mother so I know the boys were safe.

Therefore, I guess this travel inclination will probably be passed on to the next generation.

Ummm.... and you know where Art is saying he wants to go next. Sigh...

Skinny, Crazy Newspaper

Art and I like to read the Star Advertiser newspaper every morning with his coffee (black) and my mocha breakfast. I know we can get a digital copy online, but we like to continue getting that hardcopy. 

He's used to immediately read the front page verrrry carefully and then the sports page carefully. 

I read the Local/Daily Break & Business section. No, I didn't pay any attention to the Business stuff. The Local/Daily Break section has (Advice Columnist) Carolyn Hax, JUMBLE, Super Quiz, Crosswords and the comics. 

Eventually, Art felt bad about hogging the Front page section because I'd finished my mocha and did the dishes while he was still reading that front page.

So he made a bit of a sacrifice and started to give me the Front pages first while he read the sports pages. I don't pay all that much attention to the Front page section because I'd already seen most of it online or in the evening TV news reports. I do like the editorial page though.

Anyway, before Art is even close to done with the Sports pages, I hand over the Front pages to him.

I do enjoy the Advice column to see if I agree or not and I do invariably agree with Carolyn Hax. I then move over to the comics and decide which ones to cut out for my 5 and 8 year old grandsons who now live in South Asia. Both can now read and love getting my envelopes full of the selected weekday comics and the multi page Sunday comics section which seems more geared to kids.

Well.... First, the Star Advertiser cut out the Saturday hard copy paper and required you to just read it online. Art's black coffee and my mocha just didn't taste the same without the hard copy morning newspaper.

Meanwhile, the price of the newspaper subscription went up. 

I know newspapers are hurting so we want to support them.

However, this last cost cutting measure is even more irritating. The newspaper is now noticeably thinner and they have COMBINED the Sports page AND the Local&Business! 😖

What?!?! Aggravation! 

Ah well... I guess you just have to adapt.  Art now has control of the Sports AND the Local/Daily Break & Business and I get the Front pages first. 

If they start combining them ALL into one section, it's going to make us wonder if it's worth it. Sigh...

But then there's his black coffee and my mocha to think about.

POSTSCRIPT 1: 

OK, and here's a new one. 

Last week, they delivered the Monday paper on Thursday!

Aggravation!

Yes, they sent the correct Thursday issue an hour later but by then Art was done with his black coffee and I was done with my mocha and we'd (sigh) read the digital copy on our phones anyway. 🙄

POSTSCRIPT 2:

Oh my gosh! You are not going to believe this!

They've changed the format again!

Now the Front Page and Local is together and the Sports and my Daily Break with Carolyn Hax, Jumble, Comics, etc. are together.

OK, I can live with this. What the heck. 

I can scan the Front pages and hand it over to Art quickly. 

Then I can take my time with making those comic selections to mail to my grandsons and do the JUMBLE.

Do you suppose other couples who drink black coffee and mocha complained to the Star Advertiser?  🙄

Holiday Stress

And now it's the Christmas stress. I have several friends and cousins who have told me it's a super stress time. Bah humbug! 😂 They're just kidding. I think.

To be honest, I just got done with one stressful but happy holiday and now it's on to another.  

What I'm grateful for.... WISH LISTS!  I've asked our kids to give us wish lists for our grandkids and now my nieces have kindly agreed to give me wish lists for their kids each year. It makes my life so much EASIER. 

As for my kids and their spouses, we each buy for just one person every year (using their wish lists). It's wonderful! I love it! I start thinking of extravagant things I would like throughout the year that I would not buy for myself so I can present it to my Not So Secret Santa. 

However, I still need to start thinking about baking my fruitcakes for neighbors and other loved ones. It does happen to be one of Art's favorite holiday treats.

Many families have Christmas decorations with lights already hung around their homes. 

Nope, not us. We don't even have our tree up yet. We will. We will. The gifts we already received just don't look the same under the table.

So yes, there's holiday stress, but we'll get into the spirit.

So you can imagine our surprise when we saw this on the road recently. OK... maybe a little extreme but I did burst out laughing.

POSTSCRIPT:

For my Jewish friends in Illinois and Israel, "Happy Hannukah!" 

I wish you peace and hope in the coming days.

Wildfires in Hawaii

The wildfires on August 8th in Lahaina has spurred more fear and worry among many residents in Hawaii. There was a wildfire on the Big Island too which didn't get much news because of the overwhelming horror of the fire on Maui that destroyed the famous town and displaced and killed so many residents.

Now... every time I pass a stretch of brown, dry grass... I worry and wonder. How close is it to our home? How strong is the wind? What would I save first if it came close to our house? How far should you keep vegetation away from the house? 

And then, one morning in November as we were on our way to our tai chi class in Mililani, we saw smoke in the mountains.

That Mililani fire lasted close to two weeks. Friends in Mililani told me that ashes from the fire fell on their lawns. 

There were people in Lahaina who had no time to grab anything before fleeing. Many didn't have their credit cards, extra clothes, medication, financial information... They had nothing.

We have a firesafe. I'm thinking about what needs to be put in it. 

And I'm thinking about all that dried grass a few blocks away.

It's winter in Hawaii now. It's been raining off and on all day and I'm so glad. Then again it means there will be more wild vegetation and in the summer, there will be more dried grass which will become fuel for a fire.

Sigh...

Ah well... I'll just enjoy the rain for now.

A Belated Thanksgiving

My very special nephew is an ER nurse so his busy schedule sometimes prevents us from having our family holiday get-togethers at the usual time. 

This time, instead of having it on November 23rd, we had our time together this past Saturday. 

Therefore, we were able to relax 2 weeks ago. However, this past week was an extremely busy one. I prepared the lup cheong (Chinese sausage) stuffing on Tuesday. It required a LOT of prep work to get all the ingredients chopped and ready to mix with mochi rice. I then froze it.

Wednesday was the day to clean the house, get the buffet tables set up with all the take-home containers for family to take home left overs.

Thursday: We were gone just about all day for lots of tests, mostly for me at the Tripler Hospital.

Friday: Crazy day to prepare stuffing for the turkey, cooking my flan, roasting sweet potatoes, etc. However it was brining the turkey that turned out to be the most arduous of all. We'd bought a 21 pound turkey. No, we didn't need such a big turkey. Sigh... When you add the brine it would make it very heavy. If you put it into our sturdy giant soup pot, it would be very, very heavy. I was envisioning our glass shelf in the refrigerator breaking. 

So we went out and bought a brining bag. That's when I learned with that big brining bag, the whole turkey wouldn't get covered with the solution. We tried propping it up, but it still wasn't great. In the end, we put it in the smaller soup pot and added more water. It sort of worked but was still heavy. 

Saturday: Art prepared his pumpkin pie, while I chopped and diced what mom would need for her signature macaroni salad. She wanted to make it for the family as she'd always done. 

And just around that time we saw something that sent shock waves and fear into our hearts. Termite droppings!!!

And it was all over the floor. Mom often cleans the kitchen floor almost daily, so we just missed this. When I opened the drawers, I saw more termite poop. Arrrghhh!

However, we were plugging along. Turkey was roasting and we waited for mom to wake up so she could start her macaroni salad. That's when we realized that even with the recipe in hand, she couldn't do it. So I needed to do 95% of the preparation while watching mom to make sure she did not forget and continuously add something where it wasn't supposed to go. 

Yes, it was stressful and took twice the time anticipated which made our turkey carving late. It also delayed our making the gravy.

My brother and family arrived while Art was trying to carve what he could of the turkey and then we dashed upstairs to change our clothes and freshen up. We were really tired.

When we came down again, it was joyous to see everybody again.

We took several photos before we got one we liked.

Everybody brought several dishes to share. There was more than enough food and definitely enough for everyone to bring some home for dinner the following night.

And this year, like last year younger people were given the OK to take over duties like the distribution of desserts, helping with left-over packing, cleaning up, etc. 

It was wonderful!

And if that wasn't enough wonderfulness, our neighbor surprised us with her church group to sing Christmas carols and dance the hula for us.

How much more wonderful can a Thanksgiving be?

Buuut... I'm thinking that when it's our turn to make the turkey again, Kentucky Fried chicken would be the way to go.

When I'm 64?

I just got an email from our high school Reunion Committee.

They are organizing a 75th birthday celebration.

At first I was surprised. I'm 74 years young, but 75 suddenly sounded old.

How can this be?

Remember the song written by Paul McCartney of the Beatles? When I'm 64?

When I get older losing my hair

Many years from now

Will you still be sending me a Valentine

Birthday greetings bottle of wine

If I'd been out till quarter to three

Would you lock the door

Will you still need me, will you still feed me

When I'm sixty-four

You'll be older too

And if you say the word

I could stay with you...

I wonder how old Paul McCartney was when he wrote this song. 64 sounds so young now. Why does 75 sound much older than 74? 

And since when did I get considered old? And why is it when we get together with friends, most of our conversation is about our health?

Here in Hawaii, I do love the fact that young counter servers always call us "Auntie" or "Uncle" instead of "Grandma or Grandpa."

I have noticed that in the last several years, my daughter is often worried about us. She speaks to me in a slightly different tone. Almost like talking to a child and she often reminds me that I've already told her something.

It's funny because I catch myself talking to my mom that way. I don't particularly like it so it's a reminder for me to be more understanding of her forgetfulness.

But gosh...when did this happen? Aches and pains are happening more now. And yes, it's true I'm more forgetful. Walking up stairs is more tiring. But old? I prefer saying older.

Sigh.

Art just reminded me of something. He is 5 years older than me. He's wondering how he'll feel when he hits that magic 80 mark. Actually he's in much better condition than me. I suspect it's from all the exercising he does. He's also got a FAR BETTER memory than me. 

OK. OK... I suppose this is a warning for me to start moving.

Sigh...

POSTSCRIPT: The other day, mom asked Art how old he was because although he's losing his hair, it's still pretty black. He told her to guess and she said, "70." 

What?!? I asked her if she actually thought he looked younger than me. She said, "He has black hair."

🙄

And no, I'm not dyeing my hair. I'm lucky if I remember to comb it in the morning.

Spam Comments That Are Not Spam

I do periodically check my Blogger Spam box and often see legitimate blogger friends' comments placed there for inexplicable reasons. 

Spam is really annoying. If I do spot it in my regular feed, I try to quickly mark them as Spam. Several of the ones I'm hit with often are from: Aaliyah, Sport-KH, footballandcasinoufa, Emma, Emily, Escort Service in Gurgaon, ufa88cambodia, Rajani Rehana, okbet13, Achima, Mary,  Anna.... and so on and so forth. 

Recently, I decided to look way back in my spam file and saw a number of comments that went to the Spam box that were from regular blogger friends.

I'm finding that these comments had only 1 or 2 words.

So...

Then I'm wondering if Spammers had at one time confiscated identifies and thrown in these 1 word comments or did friends happen to actually write 1 word comments which were then thrown by Blogspot-bot into the Spam box.

Sheesh! 

I don't know.

Whatever the case, I really need to check my Spam box more often.

And just in case, I'll be sure to comment with at least 5 word sentences.

You never know...

Thoughts and Prayers?

 I saw this cartoon last month on the editorial page.

It's funny because right after that awful Maine mass shooting tragedy, I heard another politician say he was offering "thoughts and prayers" to everyone.

I wince every time I hear that phrase "thoughts and prayers." It's become so trite and for me almost uncaring. I know that's weird, but it's used so often that it feels meaningless.

I guess it's easier to offer thoughts and prayers instead of working on gun control. 

And then there's that Maine U.S. representative, Jared Golden (Democrat, no less) who now seeks "forgiveness" for his past opposition to gun control.

What?!?

You were opposing gun control despite all those other mass shootings going on around our country? BUT when it's in your own hometown, THEN you change your mind?

I don't know what else to say. I'm so %^&** off.

Pandemic Project Completed At Last

It all started out as a pandemic project. I decided to go through all our scanned family photos and make books detailing what happened each year. I've kept a journal since our children were born so I could fill in explanations for the photos.

I had been using Costco to print our books, but during the pandemic, Costco stopped printing books and turned all our accounts over to Shutterfly where books cost a LOT more. 

There was also a steep learning curve for me. Costco always listed their books as 8.5"x11". Shutterfly's books are listed as 8" x ll". However, when I made that 1/2" adjustment, my photo pages got cut off at the top and sides. Arrghh...

It turned out that although Shutterfly lists their books as 8"x11", it's actually the same as Costco. 

Arrrghhh...

When I got to Book 2, I discovered that Shutterfly was printing my photos much too dark. Luckily, they allowed me to redo my pages and they printed it again. 

When I got to Book 3, I learned that they also periodically offer deals which give you free pages. Since my books have 100 pages, it's really expensive. So Books 3 and 4 cost half as much as Books 1 and 2. Arrrghhh! 

So finally, finally.... I got done with Book 5 a couple of months ago and it was finally, finally perfect. 🙄

Sigh... I hope my kids and grandkids are happy.

POSTSCRIPT: 

And now it's the holidays. I know it's a time of happiness and all that... but gosh... right now... it's rather stressful thinking of all I have to do.

Do You Know Your State's Nickname?

Last month I wrote a post about all the evergreen trees at our daughter, Tiffany's home in Illinois. Margaret and DJan reminded me that their state of Washington is nicknamed the Evergreen State.

On that same day, Art and I were having lunch and testing ourselves with the Super Quiz in the Star Advertiser.

The Subject was Potpourri.

The question that really stumped us was #7.

Which state is  "The Land of Steady Habits"?

Really?

We thought and thought and really couldn't even come up with a guess.

When we looked at the answers, we discovered it was CONNECTICUT.

Seriously?

Connecticut?

When I looked it up at 50 States.com, I saw that Connecticut is actually called the Constitution State.

But when I looked under Connecticut's Nicknames, I discovered they had FOUR nicknames!!!

The Constitution State, The Nutmeg State, The Provisions State and yup...The Land of Steady Habits.

What? Couldn't they decide on just one?

I've lived in Illinois and now in Hawaii. We have only one nickname for each state.

The Aloha State and the Prairie State

Hmmmm...

Granted, I've also heard Illinois being called The Land of Lincoln.

So anyway...

Do you know your state's nickname or nicknames? 

And how about the Canadians? Do you have nicknames for your provinces or territories?

Happy Thanksgiving, everybody! 

As for us, we'll be celebrating Thanksgiving next week due to scheduling difficulties with family members. But it doesn't matter. We'll enjoy the family celebration next week with just as much fun and joy at being together again. I hope my Canadian blogger buddies had a glorious time last month celebrating your Thanksgiving get-togethers also.