HOME

Today I'm thankful for my home.  I love my home.  For me, a home is a place to get away from the world.  I think Jane Austen said it best in  Emma, where she says, "There is nothing like staying at home for real comfort." I've found that since my husband retired, I probably stay home far more than I did before.  I'd just rather be here.  I love to travel and always enjoy our trips, but the best part is coming back home.

 Lately I've been seeing that I have way too much junk in my home.  In fact, really ever since I got home from Ireland I have felt that.  So I have methodically been keeping a box in one of the bedrooms and whenever I run onto something that I think I can really live without it goes into the box.  Then when the box gets full it goes to Goodwill. 

Today I had the opportunity to get rid of 3 stuffed animals (all that I could part with at this time).  I have what I call my "Weird Animal Collection" which is stuffed animals, but not your normal teddy bears.  Today I parted with my Alaskan Moose, Monkey, and my Possum.  :0)  Together with a backpack, a tote bag, and about 5 children's books, I gave them to a little girl at church who is starting a collection for CYFD.  I thought it was a good cause.

I've also donated a bunch of my music to our Stake Choir.  I told the choir director that I'd do that every time she decided to do one of my songs.  (I have a whole lateral file drawer full of choir music that I have bought.  See?  Too much junk...

I'm getting ready to start a big project.  I'm going to strip the finish off of my big island bar and paint it a barn red.  I may get it all stripped and chicken out on the barn red, but I'm definitely stripping it to see how hard it is to do.  My sister-in-law redid all her cabinets and said it wasn't as hard as she thought it would be.  I want to refinish all the other cabinets, but I just keep thinking it'd look cool if the island was barn red.  I thought about painting all the cabinets an off-white.  I had a friend who just did that to her kitchen, but I really don't think I'd like it and I don't think it'd go with the rest of the house.  I may not get to it until after Christmas, but who knows?  I'll let you know. 

Be it ever so humble......