Monthly Archives: January 2015

Puppy Pugnaciousness

We got a puppy last Summer.  A tiny, sweet, cuddly, puppy.  Did I say sweet?  Yes, she was a darling.  Did I say was?    She was docile. Ahem. She was for a time.  Then she began to grow.  She grew and grew and suddenly she became a combative, belligerent dog, kind of like a teen-ager.  She is going through the toddler, say “no” period in her life and we are having a time teaching her how to be a good puppy.  She does nothing in anger or viciousness.  She just turns into a Tasmanian devil at the most inappropriate time and I have the scars to prove it.

She wants to be with me constantly.  I find her looking at me all the time and when she is playing with Belle, she looks at me to see if I am watching, just like a child would do.  She is incredibly intelligent and I can see her trying to figure things out, like how to open the back door which she could if we didn’t keep it locked.

We got Molly a new toy yesterday.  You know those guns that shoot tennis balls?  Molly is loving this and it is really exercising her now.  I have a sore arm from pulling the lever back to shoot the balls.  Molly would run after them all day if I had the strength to continue pulling the lever.  She is learning to bring a ball back so that I can shoot another one.  It keeps her busy and she doesn’t jump on me while she is chasing the balls.

Molly is also getting to be a good watchdog.  She sits on her lawn chair on the porch and surveys her kingdom and when she sees a stranger or our neighbor out in his yard with his dog, she lets me know it.  She doesn’t sound like a puppy anymore.  She has a deep, big dog bark even though she is only six months old. I can’t wait to see how big she will be or high loud her bark will be.      I know no one will come in our back yard with three dogs sitting there watching them.   One time years ago, a doctor who had an office next door to our house had his office broken into for drugs.  The night it happened, our dogs were throwing a barking fit and I knew something was going on somewhere.  I just wish I had known it was going on at the doctor’s because I would have called the police.  Our house was safe since the dogs were barking.  When David was in the guard and was gone or when he has to work nights, I feel safer knowing I have two dogs sitting at my door ready to greet anyone who comes near.

I love Molly to pieces.   I love all three of my dogs.  They are good companions, good protectors and it’s just nice having dogs.  I have always had dogs and can’t imagine life without them.  I know when Molly grows up, she is going to be one of the best dogs we have ever had. I have said that about every dog I have gotten, and I have never been disappointed.  Bonnie will be twelve years old this year.  Old for a Labrador.  She still has a shiny coat, a wet nose and a wonderful disposition.  She spends most of her time laying on her bed in my shop since she has arthritis, but she still can show love and is a sweetheart of a dog.  Belle is my sweetheart.  She has been the best dog and has walked with me for years.  Neither of us have had many walks lately since I hurt my leg, but I am hoping that I will feel like taking walks again soon.

I don’t know if you have a dog or not, but for me, dogs are the perfect pet.  They give love, protection and companionship you can’t get with any other animals.  Hug a dog today.  Bye.

Pups, Patterns, Planting and Pain

What do all these have in common?  Not much, except for the pup and pain bit.  Let’s just say Molly Marshmallow and I have had a few altercations in the past few days.  We are trying to teach her not to jump up on us and bite our heels as we walk and it has been a very slow process.  Add to that that Molly simply loves to dash at the fence where the chickens are encaged and we are ripe for some excitement.  Add to that that she slipped right by me when I opened the gate to where the chickens were  and began chasing the chickens and all heck broke loose.  I’m just saying.  David was splitting wood up in the front yard and he said I yelled so loudly he thought I was right next to him!   I mean the neighbors a quarter of a mile down the road probably heard me.  Molly was dashing from chicken to chicken and she got either Penninah or Jemima down.  I could just see chicken feathers, chicken heads and blood everywhere and that’s when I went into action.  I happened to have a plastic bucket in my hand I was using to carry water to the chickens and I winged it at Molly with all my might.  It knocked her for a loop and she went behind the compost pile to hide and that’s where David found us.  Me holding Molly at bay and as I looked back, I saw the chickens nonchalantly sauntering into their other pen.  I ran and shut the gate and that’s when Molly ran out.  That’s also when I realize I had hurt myself somehow.  I had pulled muscles in my right leg I didn’t know I had.  I suddenly could barely walk or stand on my leg.   I don’t remember falling ,stumbling or otherwise during the excitement, but I did something.  David had to help me into the house.  I was just getting over a pinched nerve I had at the back of my knee since Thanksgiving and now I am crippled again.  The thing is, it feels better to walk than to sit down or lay down so maybe that is good.  I will have to keep active.

Anyway, Molly seems to be a little more subdued these last couple of days.  She actually sat beside me and allowed me to love on her and pet her all over without trying to bite.  She really is a sweet dog and doesn’t mean any harm, but she needs to learn that her teeth are not for biting or eating chickens.   And the chickens?  Those dorks don’t have a care in the world and have forgotten all about it.   Me, however.  Pain city.  This too shall pass.

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” I didn’t mean to hurt you, Mom.”

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Look at that sweet puppy.   Wouldn’t hurt a flea.   Ahem.   All the dogs have learned to sit and wait for their dinner.  No, they are not looking at David with adulation.  They are looking at their food dishes and wishing he would hurry up and put them down.  See how big Molly is getting?   She is the one in the middle.  I can hardly tell her from Belle from the back anymore.

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The hens have been laying a little lazily lately.  Alliteration.  But, still, we have plenty of eggs. I made egg salad the other day.  I don’t know why, but I use to think making egg salad would be hard.  Here’s how easy it is.

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First I boiled the eggs.  Boiling eggs is easy.  Let them come to a boil and then let them sit in the hot water for about twenty minutes or so.  If you ever boil eggs and the yolks are green, it’s because you have boiled them too long.  Put the eggs in cold water and peel them.  Fresh eggs do not peel easily.  If you want pretty deviled eggs, use older eggs.  My eggs are always fresh. Since it didn’t matter how pretty the eggs were in this dish, I didn’t mind that they looked this way.

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I take a potato masher and begin mashing.

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Until the eggs are mashed finely.   I add salt and pepper.  Not much.

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Then mix in mayonnaise(I use Miracle Whip).  Stir thoroughly.  I don’t like a lot of mayo in my egg salad.  I want to taste the eggs.  There’s a fine line between too dry egg salad and too wet egg salad, but that is up to you and what you like.

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And there you have egg salad.  It doesn’t last very long around here and I can go out and get fresh eggs any time and make it any time I want to.  That’s the blessing of having your own chickens.  I always tell people if you have chickens, you will never starve because you will always have eggs and if you raise chicks, you will always have chickens.  I fixed chicken and noodles yesterday from chickens I did not know personally.  My chooks will die of old age.(Or murder from a pup.)

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Seed catalogs are coming in almost daily now.  I’m pretty sure what I am going to plant this year.  Pumpkins, tomatoes and flowers.   I really don’t feel like having a big vegetable garden this year.

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I get a lot of my seeds from Wildflower Farm.  It’s based in Texas and sells seed by the pound.  A pound of zinnia seeds goes a long way.  I had zinnias planted everywhere last Summer.  I also had lots of sunflowers which the goldfinches loved.  I will probably plant some of those again.

I have been working on a new quilt top.  I love the pattern in this one.  I need to make forty-two squares.  Here are just a few of them I have already made.

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I call it Garden Quilt.  This will do until I can plant my real garden this Spring.  Bye.

 

Pinning a Quilt

Back in the seventies when my babies were babies and I didn’t have much money but a lot of determination, I decided to make a quilt.  There were no quilt shops all over the country.  Not many books teaching quilting or magazines about quilting. There certainly were no blogs about quilting and the International Quilt Market was just a dream.  The only place to get material was at the JC Penney’s or JoAnn’s fabric. I searched the library for books about quilting.  My sister had been making quilts for years, but I never really paid attention to how she did it. So I began the odyssey of learning how to piece a quilt and how to put it together.  Back then Better Homes and Gardens put out a craft magazine that had all kinds of crafts in it.  My mother used to get it and when I got married I would get it.  In one issue there were several quilt patterns.  Not like in magazines today where the quilt patterns are the actual size of the pattern, no.  I had to draft the quilt pattern myself from a drawing the magazine had of the quilt pieces on squares that you had to draw, each square equaling one inch and then draw the pattern.  It wasn’t easy, but, like I said, I was determined.  There was one pattern I especially liked called the pyramid quilt made up of triangles.  I told my sister what I was going to do and like some bossy sisters are, she told me it was impossible for me to make a quilt out of all triangles.  I’m the type of person that if someone tells me I can’t do something, that’s when I will do it and I proceeded to begin the quilt. I didn’t have the fabric stash I have now, so I had to find material wherever I could get it.  I sponged some off my mother who had been sewing for years and had her own stash.  I had material left over from sewing clothes for the children.  Soon I had enough fabric to piece the quilt.  I worked on the quilt every chance I got. With two small children at the time it was not easy.  I finally got it pieced and it sat for years waiting to be quilted.  I didn’t finish that quilt until about fifteen or twenty years later.  Then I washed it and some of the fabric ran, because at that time I didn’t know you should prewash your fabrics if you don’t want them to run.  I still have that quilt and love it. Fast forward to 2015 and I am still quilting with the same passion I had at the beginning.   Maybe more so.  I still have several quilts waiting to be completed, but I still keep starting others. I decided to get one ready to quilt this week.  The one in my header. DSCN0093

It is a king size quilt and I had to clear out our dining room to have room to lay it out.  First I had to piece the backing for it because the quilt was so large.  I laid the backing wrong side up on the floor and laid the quilt batting over that.  Then I spread the quilt over it all.  Now came the real work.  Years ago when I wanted to get a quilt ready for quilting I would put all the layers down, pin them together with straight pins and then begin to laboriously thread needles and baste the layers together.  It took forever.  Then, I saw a lady from Alaska on television and she safety pinned all her quilt layers together.  I suddenly had an epiphany.   How hard could that be??????

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I got out my little tin of safety pins that I have had forever and began to pin.

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Hundreds of pins later, I am finished and the quilt is ready to be quilted.

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I loved the way the light and shadow played on the quilt.

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Crawling around on my hands and knees putting in one pin at a time. I had entertainment while doing so. I turned on the television just for the noise until I saw the movie that was on.  One of my all time favorite movies, The Big Country, starring two of my all time favorite stars. DSCN0084

Gregory Peck. Swoon.  He was at his most handsome in this movie.  I have always loved his movies.   One of my favorites of his is called Duel in the Sun.  Omigosh, he was handsome in that one.  He was handsome until the day he died.  He was in my town one time and I missed him!  He and his wife were just passing through and stopped at our local old fashion ice cream parlor that is known world wide, Zaharakos.   People come from all over to see it.  Anyway, Gregory Peck was there one time and oh, how I wish I could have seen him.  Loretta Lynn, the country western singer,had quite the crush on Mr. Peck and one time she got to meet him and she acted like a bashful teen-ager with her idol.  I would probably have acted that way too.  There was just something about him. DSCN0098

Charlton Heston.  Swoon again.  I loved every movie I ever saw him in.   Remember Soylent Green and the very first Planet of the Apes?   He made good movies all his life from being Moses in  The Ten Commandments to Ben Hur.  I remember I went to see Ben Hur at our local movie theater with my sixth grade class.   We sat up in the balcony.  All us girls got all dressed up and felt so grownup going to a movie without our parents.  My friend and I got in trouble for talking too much and the usher told us to be quiet.   I still remember the movie and the chariot race, but I think we giggled and talked through the entire movie.  You know, I was one of those kids you don’t want to sit near in a movie?  Funny story.  One time I went to a movie and there were girls just talking constantly behind me so I sat up very tall so that they could not see around me.  One of the girls tapped me on the shoulder and told me she couldn’t see.  I told her I couldn’t hear and that if they would stop talking, I would sit down in my seat.  They were quiet the rest of the movie.  Maybe you might try that next time you have a talker behind you.

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Chuck Conners played kind of a bad boy in this movie.  I use to watch him in Rifleman on television years ago.  I had a crush on the boy who played his son. Can’t remember his name though.

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Burl Ives.  Known for playing his guitar and singing.  He had a unique voice.  He played a poor rancher fighting for the water rights to the Big Muddy River against a rich rancher.  Suffice it to say, their families did not get along.

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Jean Simmons at her prettiest as the love interest for Gregory Peck’s character.  The last time I saw her in a movie she played a quilter in How to Make an American Quilt.   She was still a pretty lady.

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The movie ends with Gregory Peck and Jean Simmons looking out at their big country.  The ranch they both loved.  I love the west.  It does seem like a big country in many places.  It’s called the Big Sky country for a reason too.  The sky just looks bigger out there.  I thoroughly enjoyed watching this movie once again.  Even the music makes one think of the west.

I said I was not going to bake for a while after Christmas and it has been almost three weeks since.  I saw this recipe for Morning Buns in my Midwest Living magazine.  It has twelve pats of butter in the dough, butter in the muffin cups and you spread butter over the dough once you roll it out.  Each bun has over 500 calories so you have eaten one fourth of your calories for the day when you eat one, but oh, they are worth it.

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The recipe makes twelve large buns.  All sugary and good.

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I’d offer you one if you were here.  Bye.

 

 

 

 

 

Threads of Time

Okay, does it seem like Christmas was ages ago?  We had our final family gathering last Saturday.  I never get tired of seeing my grandchildren.  It hit me, though, how quickly they are all growing and soon will be adults.  So any time I can spend with them is golden for me and David and I hope we can do it more this year.

I always like to take pictures when we are together although sometimes I forget because we are having fun.  But this time I took several pictures of the boys.  My granddaughter was home feeling poorly so she wasn’t with us.  Taking pictures of boys is like trying to herd cats.  You can’t get them to hold still or smile.  Here are a few pictures that I took.

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Here they are with their Enderman and Creeper from Mindcraft.  I learned more than I ever needed to know about Mindcraft while researching how to make toys for the boys.  I’m still not sure I understand it, but they knew exactly what they were when they opened the packages so I breathed a sigh of relief.

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Boys in motion.

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I like this picture.  Rather elfin looking I think.  I knitted all the younger boys scarves and hats.

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Eating the new sweatshirt I just gave him.

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This young man is thirteen and wears size twelve shoes.  Or, as he told me, he can wear eight and a half shoes also.  Huh?!  Just know his foot is about twice as long as mine.  And he is still growing.  He’s on the basketball team.  His grandfather on his mother’s side played a lot of basketball and he is following in his footsteps.

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My lovely daughter with her oldest.   We had a grand time and I look forward to seeing them all again.  My younger grandsons are already asking me when Grandma’s camp is going to be.  We want to take them caving this summer.

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If you live in the northern states you know we are being hit by Artic air right now.  I almost got frostbite this morning cleaning out the chicken house and feeding them.  I keep candles burning because it just makes me feel warmer.

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I brought my sewing indoors as the dogs have taken over my shop for the duration of this cold.

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I am getting ready to quilt this quilt.  It’s kingsize and I’m not sure whether I will hand quilt it or do it on the sewing machine.  I think it’s called Granny Squares.  I pieced it a year or so ago and am just getting ready to finish it.

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It’s been a nice quilt to use up my bits and pieces of fabric.  Since I have quite a stash, I could make several more of these.

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Each block has a different color scheme.

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This will be the backing.  We sold this when we had our quilt shop.  I have loved it ever since and wanted to use it in something I will keep.

This week I had the joy of teaching a friend and her two cute daughters how to piece a block and learn some quilt basics.  They decided to make pot holders.  After a lot of cutting, sewing, tearing out a couple of times and sewing again, they almost finished them except for a border or two.

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It brought back memories when I use to teach quilt classes at our store.  It is so rewarding to see someone who does not know about quilting learn about it and find out it’s fun.  Their pot holders show their individuality. Pam picked Christmas fabric to match some new dishes she received.

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Tiffany picked bold, floral fabrics that made a beautiful pot holder.

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Danielle picked homespun fabrics and I really liked how her pot holder turned out.

It was fun and made me want to teach classes again.  See behind Danielle?  Molly and Belle watched us continuously.  This was usually their naptime and didn’t know why I wasn’t letting them into the shop.

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I got this cute mug Saturday.  My grandchildren and their mom and stepdad went to Cleveland where the Christmas Story house is.

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I love this mug.  It holds about two cups of coffee…………

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or hot chocolate.  If you are in the freezer this week, stay warm, drink hot chocolate and enjoy your indoor time.  This, too, will pass.  Bye.

 

 

 

Catching My Breath

We took down the Christmas tree and other decorations today and, surprisingly, I didn’t feel sad about doing it.  I feel like I have been on a roller coaster for the last three months and I look forward to one month of doing as little as possible.  I won’t have to clean for company, cook big meals, hunt for gifts, or do any of the other things that come with the holidays.  Our holidays seem to start at Halloween and don’t finish until a week after Christmas.  I love it all, but I am ready for some slow down time.   It was nice getting the house back into order and the sun is shining brightly in the window where the tree once stood.

Soon I am hoping to start a Bible study if I can get a few women who would like to join me.  If not, I will study by myself.  I am either going to do Beth Moore’s Daniel study which I have done before or her 1st and 2nd Thessalonians  study.  I have done almost all of Beth Moore’s Bible studies and learned so much, plus they are very enjoyable and fun too.

I have two quilts I plan to start quilting, one by hand and one on the sewing machine.  I also have two that I plan to piece.  There is a shop hop in February where I will collect more fabric for these two quilts.  If you don’t know what a shop hop is, it is several quilt shops who get together and have  prizes and treats for the quilters who shop at their businesses on the special days.  They usually also have quilt block kits which you can buy and if you buy them all you have enough for a quilt.  I usually don’t do this as I like to pick out my own material and patterns.  They sell a shop hop pass which puts you in the running for prizes at each store.  One year I won $50 worth of fabric which was really nice for me as I don’t have enough fabric.  Ha!

This week I had a friend and her two daughters over to learn how to piece a quilt block.  They made pot holders.  It was fun to watch them as they learned some of the basics of quilting.  I was rather a work horse and made them rip out pieces that were not quite straight, but I knew they would not be happy with the finished result unless they did so.  I know I have had to rip out a lot while piecing especially when I was first learning how to quilt. Anyway, they almost completed their pot holders, including quilting them on the machine and adding binding.  I took pictures and will try to show them on my next post.  I think they were happy with their handy work.  I know I was proud of them and how much they accomplished.

Now I am enjoying just sitting here watching the snow blow off the garage roof.  It is frigidly cold here with the wind blowing steadily.  Have to wrap up including your nose when you go outside unless you want frostbite. If you live in a warm climate and are reading this, I envy you, just a little right now.   It is sunny which makes for a beautiful day, but even the chickens are staying inside  and they hardly ever do that.  Belle, Bonnie and Molly Marshmallow sleep warmly in my shop when it is this cold.  They are nice company when I am working out there.

Hope wherever you are you are warm and cozy and looking forward to this brand new year.  Bye.

 

2015

Happy New Year.  Yes, I’m a day late, but I was busy New Year’s Day.  I had to watch all those old Twilight Zone shows I have watched dozens of times through the years.  I can remember when I was a girl and Twilight Zone just started and how we all gathered in the living room to watch it every week.  Rod Sterling or is it Serling, always introduced each show and the Twilight Zone music would come on and give me the shivers.

While watching Twilight Zone I did what I have done every year since I was a girl. I made pillowcases.  My mother always said we had to make pillowcases on New Year’s Day.  I don’t know why.  Luck?  We needed them? Tradition?  She just wanted me to do something?  Anyway, I make pillowcases on New Year’s Day.

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I made three and I also finished a new ironing board cover.

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I can never find pretty ironing board covers and I iron a lot since I sew a lot and I like having pretty ironing board covers on my ironing board.   They are so easy to make and I can change them out when I get tired of one or the old one gets too raggedy.  I wear out ironing board covers and irons regularly as I use them so much.  There are days that the iron is on all day.  I am very pleased with this one.  The fabric had lines I could quilt on and I finished it in a couple of days to include cutting it out, quilting it and putting in the elastic.  It fits really well.  Better than any store bought ironing board cover.  How many times have I written ironing board covers in this paragraph?   Belle keeps check on me hoping she can come in and sleep for a while in the shop.  A lot of the time I have three dogs sleeping in here while I work.  Belle snores.  Loudly.  I want to record her and let you hear her sometime.

I also painted lampshades.  I read a blog where this lady painted her white lampshades to make them look like Tiffany glass when lit.  I’m not that good an artist so mine aren’t elaborate, but with the shades painted, the lamps give off a softer light.

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I may never have a white shade in my house ever again.

I also had to eat cabbage(sauerkraut) for New Year’s.  Once again a tradition my mother started.  I put a little brown sugar and some celery seed in the sauerkraut and it is delicious.  Sauerkraut and sausages.  Yum.

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Tomorrow we are having Christmas with three of our grandchildren who were in Chicago Christmas day.  My grandsons are into Mind Craft things and so they got some Mind Craft things, but then I got it into my head to make some Mind Craft dolls.  This is supposed to be the Creeper.  Since my grandson doesn’t read my blog, I can show him.

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This is his face.  His whole body is supposed to be made out of pixels, I think, but there was no way I was sewing that many little squares on fabric.  Hope he likes him.

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I walked around today looking at our outside decorations.  We are leaving them up until January 6th for the twelve days of Christmas and then they will be put away for another year.  I really loved decorating our new front porch.

It was a busy day.  Oh, and I dyed my hair.  What color??  You will have to wait and see.

Hope you have a very pleasant, healthy and prosperous New Year.  Whatever it brings, just know there is One who watches over us all and wants the best for us.  Happy New 2015!  Bye.

 

Sleds and Santa

This is one of my Hoosier Girl stories.   Things I remember.  It may not be what other members of my family remember,  but I’m sticking with my story.

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  A heavy blanket of snow covered Daddy’s Indiana farm.  Katie looked out the kitchen door and saw drifts of snow on the sidewalk and back porch.  Daddy came in the back door carrying an armload of firewood to put in the big  black iron stove that sat in the kitchen. As Katie ate her breakfast of hot sweet tea and cinnamon toast, she felt warm and cozy.  Daddy sat at the head of the table and Mommy sat next to him. They were discussing what needed to be done that day on the farm.

  Katie’s brothers came down from the cold upstairs.  Katie’s bedroom window had had frost on the inside of it that morning!   She had not wanted to leave her warm nest in her bed.

  “Hey, let’s go sledding this afternoon,” said Andy.  That sounded like a great idea to all the children  First all the chores must  be done before play.  On a farm the livestock comes first and all the animal must be fed and watered before anything else.  The eggs must be gathered before they froze in their nests.  That was Katie’s job.  Soon they were all bundled to go outdoors to do their chores.

  The cold wind whipped Katie’s face as she walked to the chicken house.  Inside it was warm and the chickens began clucking and stirring when they saw Katie.  Sometimes Katie would have to reach underneath a setting hen to take her egg.  The hen would not like this, but it had to be done.  Eggs were never left to be hatched in the hen house.  Mommy used many eggs in her baking each week and the ones she didn’t use were carefully washed and crated and taken to the grocery store to be sold to the grocer for him to resell.  Mother’s chicken eggs were especially good.  Thy were always fresh and the yolks almost orange.  That was because the chickens were allowed to peck and scratch outside and eat a lot of different things besides the ground corn Daddy fed them.  The eggs purchased in grocery stores today have very light colored yolks and are not always as fresh as they could be.

  After a good hot midday meal, Katie and her brothers dressed in several layers of clothes and snow boots and gloves and hats and went out to Daddy’s workshop where the sleds were kept  They walked down the road to a hill owned by a neighbor, Mr. Bond.  Sometimes he would have cows in the field where the hill was, but they never came near the children.

 They climbed over the fence and trudged through the deep snow to the top of the hill.  It seemed gigantic to Katie.  The first few times sledding down were not very good because paths had to be made through the snow.  After a few rides down the hill it became slicker and slicker until you were absolutely flying!  At the bottom of the hill was a small grove of trees that had to be maneuvered through.  It was dangerous, but fun at the same time.  Sometimes the Clevenger boys, who lived across the road, came over and joined the fun.  The boys liked to throw snowballs at one another as they sled down the hill.  Katie liked it when they threw snowballs at her even though she cried for them to stop.

  All too soon for Katie it was time to go back home.  She was chilled to the bone but hadn’t noticed while she was sledding.  Back in the warm house Mommy made hot chocolate and Daddy popped corn and made popcorn balls.  After all the exercise it all tasted so good.

  Sometime during the winter season Daddy and Mommy began whispering to one another and hiding things from the children.  It was Christmas time, one of the best times of the year for a child.  Soon after Thanksgiving the Christmas tree would be cut down and set in the front room and decorated and Mommy would put the red plastic wreaths with the red bulbs in the windows.  A plastic Santa riding a reindeer was one of Katie’s favorite Christmas decorations.  It lit up and looked so merry.

 Katie became so excited  that she was about to burst with excitement.  There would be a Christmas party at school and a special Christmas program at church to celebrate Jesus’ birth.  It was all wonderful.

  As Christmas drew nearer Katie could hardly contain herself.  What would Santa bring her this year?  Then, finally, it was Christmas Eve.  One year Katie wanted to stay up and see if Santa was really the one who brought the toys each Christmas.  She begged Mommy to allow her to stay up if her older sister, Joanne, stayed up with her. “You may stay up, but you will be asleep before Santa gets here,” said Mommy.

  That night Katie and Joanne each picked a chair to sleep in.  With pillows and blankets they prepared to stay up and see old St. Nick bring their presents.  Katie waited and waited until she felt her eyelids becoming heavier and heavier.

  All at once there was a soft glow in the room  Katie rubbed her eyes because she could not believe what she was seeing.  In front of her, so close she could have touched him, was a short, round little man in a beautiful red wool suit with the whitest fur trim.  He had a grand beard that covered his chest.  Katie sat in silence for fear the man would notice her.  It was Santa Claus and he might be angry to see her watching.  Suddenly he turned around and looked directly at Katie and smiled at her and said, “Go back to sleep, Honey.”  Katie felt no fear, but a feeling of love surrounded her.  The next thing Katie knew she was waking up in her own bed.  It was Christmas morning.

  The children all had to wait until Mommy and Daddy said it was okay to come down the stairs.  When they did. there was a mad dash to get to the Christmas tree to see what Santa had left them.  Katie doesn’t remember what she got that year, but she does remember it was the year she saw the real Santa Claus.

The End

   I remember this as though it were yesterday.  It is as real to me today as it was when I was a little girl.  I believe.  Bye.