Wednesday Hodgepodge 30/11/16

Wednesday's Hodgepodge is brought to us courtesy of Joyce at 

 From this side of the pond

Pop over there to see other posts and if you want to join in add the link to your Hodgepodge blog post to the Linky List at the end of Joyce's post and don’t forget to visit at least your neighbours on the list.

Have fun!

1. Give us three rhyming words that say something about your Thanksgiving holiday (or your most recent holiday gathering if you didn't celebrate Thanksgiving).

Hungry then Happy!
2. When did you last say, 'the more the merrier'? Did you mean it?
I really can’t remember but I probably would have meant it.
3. What's one piece of advice you'd give someone who is your same age?
Stop worrying about things that have happened.  We can’t go back and change the past.  It’s how we move forward that’s important.
4. You're ordering a veggie plate, what four veggies are on it?
Mushrooms, mashed potatoes, sweet potato and sweetcorn. (can you tell I'm not a veggie? lol)
5. Shop till you drop! Did you? Have you ever? Will you between now and Christmas?
I can remember one year when I was working taking advantage of the 24 hour opening of the supermarket just before Christmas and wandering around in a tired daze in the early hours of the morning.  Not something I’m planning on repeating, EVER!
6. What's your favourite chair in your house, and why is it a favourite?

That’s the one I’m sitting in now – it’s on a two seater sofa that is a recliner.  It’s very comfy for sitting with my laptop and/or watching the TV.
7. Share an early memory of faith, religion, or spirituality.
I don’t have any early memories but I was really moved by the number of people who offered prayers for my husband when he had a serious accident back in 2005 and it certainly worked.
8. Insert your own random thought here.

I have been sitting on this news for 6 weeks but having had her 12 week scan yesterday I can now announce my daughter is expecting a baby!  These first few weeks haven’t been completely smooth but everything seems ok now so we hope to become grandparents next June.  We are very excited!

And for those of you who follow Poppy’s progress – she’s just started crawling!  She will be one next week so she’s still a bit behind after the long spell in hospital but she’s catching up fast.

I'm ready to surrender - 25/11/16

Five Minute Friday 

You can find the prompt for this challenge at 

 Heading Home. 

 

Here’s how it works:

Every Thursday, a one-word prompt will be announced on Kate's blog at 10pm EST.

 

 

The link-up is open for a full week, until the following Thursday evening.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 To participate in Five Minute Friday, all you have to do is write for five minutes on the word of the week, post your words on your own blog, and link up the post on Kate's blog (via the InLinkz button at the bottom of the post). Be sure to add the actual permalink to your specific post, and not your blog’s homepage (e.g. http://katemotaung.com/five-minute-friday/ and not just katemotaung.com).

Just write.

Also, the most important rule is that you visit the blog of the person who linked up before you and leave some encouragement.  That’s the most fun of all, and the heart of this community.

The word this week is Surrender

One of the things I sometimes find hard to surrender to is sleep.  I can often get to sleep quite easily but if anything disturbs me during the night getting back to sleep can be difficult.  I can be awake for ages, tossing and turning, wide awake.  I'll often get my ipad or even pick up my book.

When things were really bad before I gave up my very stressful job I've even been known to get up and watch TV rather than disturb my hubby with my restlessness.  I find myself wishing my brain had an off switch.

One way that has helped is talking to God in my head.  I usually try to think of the things I'm thankful for and then I start working through my family and friends talking about what they need or about the things they need help working through.

Of course that can be a very long list of people - our family is large and I've come across some wonderful people through blogging who, at times, will have mentioned situations they are going through.

I often don't get to the end of my list before surrendering to sleep.  Just taking the time to focus on something positive manages to calm my racing brain.

I'm often up late so you would think I'd be tired enough to sleep through the night but this is not the case most nights.  However tonight, although it's only just after 10 pm I can feel myself ready to surrender to sleep.

Let's hope the urge will last until morning!

Friday's Fave Five - 25/11/16

It's Friday so it's time to join in with Suzanne's Friday's Fave Five.   
It's a place to come on Fridays and think back over your week and just post about 5 favourite things from your week. It can be anything that tickled your fancy over the week. Favourite quotes, posts, happenings, scriptures, recipes, pictures, great internet finds, etc., etc.

If you want to take part or visit other Fave Five posts, click on the picture above to go to host Suzanne's site and check out the linky list.



This week has been fairly quiet so I had to think hard to find my favourite five but here they are:

Time with our eldest son - he was here last weekend.

Being able to help my daughter as she prepares to move house.

Preparing a Thanksgiving style dinner for our American DIL.  We had turkey and amongst the side dishes I found a recipe for a green bean casserole which is a favourite of hers.  I even managed to get some French's fried onions.  It was well received and we followed up with homemade baked chocolate cheesecake.  Of course she didn't have time off as she is a teacher but we did enjoy the meal together.

Skype - our DIL was able to skype with her family yesterday and feel part of their celebrations.

Getting my hair done.  It's always good to get rid of the grey roots showing through!

I hope all my American friends had a great Thanksgiving and all of you have a good weekend.

Wednesday Hodgepodge - 23/11/16

Wednesday's Hodgepodge is brought to us courtesy of Joyce at 

 From this side of the pond

Pop over there to see other posts and if you want to join in add the link to your Hodgepodge blog post to the Linky List at the end of Joyce's post and don’t forget to visit at least your neighbours on the list.

Have fun!

1. What's something you might say runs in your family? 

Well we’ve all been runners at some point in our lives.  Mine was back in the distant memories of my early 20s.  Hubby kept going for some years but not now.  My daughter has had spells of running but currently my boys are both runners.  The youngest has run the London Marathon twice and the eldest has done several half-marathons.

We’re also pretty competitive except hubby so the kids must get it from me!  We don’t like losing, although we’re not bad losers.  (Well the kids may choose to differ on that one – my eldest son HATES to lose!)

2. I read here a list of ten things you should do before 2017 arrives (in less than six weeks!)...which tasks on the list might you do? What would you add to your own 'before the year ends' list?

visit your Dr. or dentist, deep clean your home, donate unwanted items to charity, look someone in the eye and tell them you love them, write an honest letter to yourself, clean up your inbox-desktop-photos, travel to a place you haven't been, compliment a stranger, watch the sunrise, think ahead to your goals/plans for the new year

Not due a dental or medical visit so hopefully won’t be seeing either of those.

Might deep clean the area where the Christmas decorations will be

Definitely have some stuff for the charity shop

I’m always telling hubby I love him

No time for letter writing and the clean up list is a permanent fixture on my to-do list

Travel – probably not this side of Christmas

Compliment a stranger – hopefully as that’s a nice thing to do

Watch the sunrise?  Have you not been listening to my waffle?  I am so NOT a morning person lol

Plan ahead – that’s definitely up there along with:

Finish off the guest room.  (Just a couple of things to do but I don’t want them to get forgotten in the run up to Christmas.)

3. What's something other generations (not your own) misunderstand about your generation?
I think most generations think the previous generation don’t understand them but we forget they have usually been there and got the T shirt when it comes to understanding relationships.
4. Sweet potato casserole, mashed potatoes and gravy, cornbread dressing-which would you miss the most if it weren't on the holiday dinner menu?

From that list mashed potatoes and gravy but we wouldn’t have that as part of the menu.  For me it would be roast potatoes.
5. What are you overthinking right now?

How to help my daughter and her wife without offending my DIL.
6. Your favorite slang word lately?

Not a lover of slang.  Even my text messages and e-mails are usually fully worded and punctuated!
7. Write an acrostic for the word grateful.

Gratitude

Really

Accentuates

The

Empathy

For

Unselfishness and

Love

8.  Insert your own random thought here.

Composing a Hodgepodge post is a great way of procrastinating over all those things on that to do list!

Thanks Joyce for another great set of questions.