Recipe for a Lovely January Morning

Do not go outside.
Drink coffee.
Dress in warm robe and furry slippers.
Gather all my "things" nearby.  Book, computer, phone, bills to pay, daytimer.

I woke up to the sound of wind this morning, and it's not a good sound on garbage day with all those wheeled containers ready to take off.  Elise put ours out last night beside the car, and they're staying put.  So far.  The apartment next to me is empty, and those cans are therefore empty and sitting outside for some reason.  I wonder if they'll be rolling around.

This wind is something else.  I love it, but it's not so good for the ones who lost power and had trees and power lines to fall.  The Seattle windstorm is past, but I read last night that Snoqualmie and North Bend are about to get a "gap" wind.  It seems the warm Pacific air meets the cold mountain air, and the wind comes right through Snoqualmie Gap down the interstate to poor us, supposedly 25-30 MPH winds and gusts up to 50 MPH.

So far balcony is good.  I took down the bird feeder and hummingbird feeder, but the geranium took a spill off it's stand.  Luckily, it landed right side up so no harm done.  We still have another 20 hours to go though.  The one good thing is that it's not raining or cold, although there is 100% chance of rain today.

So staying inside until 3:00 when I have to pick up Katherine.

I've started the ambitious job of taking everything out of my filing cabinet and reassessing and redoing.  The top drawer is the important one with all the papers that need to be saved.  I tossed old hanging files and pulled out some new ones and made new labels last night.   Today will be spent going through each one and deciding what needs to be kept and what can be thrown away.

The first one, of course, is Automobile, and it's so hard to let this one go.  Mike used the stapler very freely and would staple important things, like titles, to the file folder, but he rarely lost anything.

I'll keep this paperwork, even though it's really old.  It's all the stuff from the 1979 Dodge Aspen, the Bratmobile that hauled so many children back and forth during the 80s and 90s.  I hope I have a picture of it somewhere.  It was a good faithful car, bought when Emily was 1-year-old, Elise 5, and Gray 7.  I found this picture that is similar.  We bought it in 1979, but it was used.

I was looking at the trade-in and puzzled over the 1971 Menace and then realize it was a 1971 Monaco, which was Mike's parents' car they had given/sold us.  I don't remember the details.

We kept it until 1992 and, according to Mike's handwritten sales note, sold it to Mary Bush "as is" for $100.  I remember Mary well but not how we knew her.  Maybe she worked for Mike.  She had a daughter named Rose (for real), and I also remember that transaction, I believe at her house, but nothing else about her.  Since we paid about $6000, I think it was a good investment.  I don't remember it giving us any trouble, but then I wouldn't have had to worry about things like that back then.

Seeing this hurts my heart.

We had Christine, the Stephen King car look-alike for a few years then too.  Our neighbor Roz would never cross the street in front of it and always walked behind it when she came over.

I can tell I'm going to get lost in my memories today.

And the rain has started.

And the snow and the sleet.

Horizontal snow and sleet.

I heard an ominous noise outside and looked down to see a small Christmas tree lying against my recycling can and garbage cans all over the place, so I put on my bravest face and a raincoat over my pajamas and went down to see what I could do.  Soooo cold.  My hands were pieces of ice by the time I got the garbage can in the garage and hauled the neighbor ones up to their garage doors.  That Christmas tree - I just left there.

I can't express how glad I am we decided that Ryan would take the children to school in the mornings.  That South Dakota boy will think nothing of it.  I see families walking to school right now.  Maybe I'm a wimp, but I don't want that to be me!  Ryan not only delivered the children but came by and reset our WiFi stuff and did something to my phone to keep it better charged.

 Layla is a little concerned.  She will lie on the floor and look outside through the blind slats but won't go onto the balcony unless I'm with her.  The sounds bother her and send her flying back inside.

 It was so nice to have her lying against my back this morning purring and keeping me warm.    Elise doesn't like the name Layla and is trying out a bunch of different names.

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Now it's hours later, and the wind is still blowing pretty hard, but it's stopped snowing, and all the garbage cans have been retrieved.  That Christmas tree is still down there, so I guess it's my responsibility now!