Small Freedoms and Other Mainly Good Things

I really just do not do well at all with the time changes. I am already on the edge energy wise with my thyroid and it seems like even that single lousy hour knocks me for a loop for like a week.  I also wish they would just make daylight savings time regular time (seriously kids in the north are gonna be in the dark either going or coming). Every year there's talk about changing and every year it doesn't happen.

Other than that bit of whine, mainly good things have happened round here.  At two weeks minus four days I have finally been out and about. I've taken a good hour plus drive in the eighty degree sunshine with the window rolled down in order to pick up my Front Porch Pantry meals. Normally I would pay the delivery fee, but as a woman who lives to drive and has so missed driving, I truly needed to hit that seventy miles per hour and stretch my driving muscles.  While out and about, I went into a craft store (or maybe two), to get the finishing items for those quilts.

Future step out plans include the quilt store (I've since found out that they have masked and social distanced sewing days and workshops, so I'll join in there) and possibly some sip and paint type craft classes down the road. I haven't gotten my hair cut yet, but that's only because I want to grow it out some after my self butchering so the poor stylist can actually do her work. I'm still considering the patio drink thing, either alone or with others who've been vaccinated.  I've considered entry to Walmart or Target or the mall, and may consider one of the above-but honestly, even pre Covid I was a mainly curbside or delivery gal. So I expect my in store forays will mainly be of the local independent variety-like the used bookstore on the square that I've just realized needed to be added to my list.

Between vaccination time and good weather, it's time for me to be doing some driving and exploring within my cautious limits, so I subscribed to a couple of those "What to do this weekend in" type webpages as well as a blog that writes about Texas small towns. Because when not making large road trips (Gulf Shores, Alabama calls my name these days, among others), my jam is the very small towns and their old squares. Many of which also happen to have quilt or yarn stores! And bakeries. And sometimes breweries or wineries.

In non-vaccine related good news, I have been poked, prodded, stretched and squeezed via my annual mammogram and trans-vaginal sonogram. I can now say two of my overdue annual tests are finished for a year and six months respectively. Next up is my skin test, being formerly a person who lived  miles closer to the unfiltered sun. 

I can't decide between the rocking and non rocking style (I am not into the deep seated wicker look or real wicker stuff)

Whatever else is involved there must be ladybugs

Also non vaccine related, the upside of moving with a third of what I owned (which I'll rectify somewhat in May or June) is that I have a lot of blank slate to play with, especially when it comes to my walls and patio. I've spent more than a few hours in the past week or two either on Pinterest or the Wayfair website and other places picking and choosing picture frames, looking at club chairs for the patio and decided on wall decor and pillows for inside and out. As well as designing some modern wall hangings to make myself for all the white walls! I get my stimulus by check in the mail rather than direct deposit, so I figure I've got three weeks to make a final decision on good chairs and some other things (After looking extensively at FB marketplace' I'm going with used in good condition for the washer and dryer).  

I also have been pulling out European photos to be framed as well as art work from both myself and son (who is a good artist when he wants to draw).

This is a simple design but I'm taking my inspiration these days from Shannon Fraser designs as I work towards more organic wall hangings, Mine would be brighter and more multicolored and random...

There are more than a few things I miss about Denver, not least of which is the sunny skies. It will be eighty here but overcast most of the day, and there is much to be said for seeing sun literally almost every day of the year. This particular week however, is not one of those. I've walked outside in seventy five to eighty degree weather daily, and have sat out on the patio every day for a good hour knitting my summer top. 

Hopefully I still love the yellow when it's done!

I do wish, vaccination or no, that folks were a little more conscious about the damned mask. Yesterday I was sitting on the patio knitting and someone came up and literally leaned on the patio mask-less, and I wished I had brought a mask outside. Guess the paranoia still exists within me.