I was cleaning shelves in my clothes closet on Sunday. We have one of those closet organizer systems, and the shelf on the top seems to be a tiny bit short. It rests on pegs that you can use to change the height of the shelf, and every now and then, if you touch it just right, it will slide off the pegs, and dump everything on you.
Well, on Sunday, it did just that. Everything slid past me and hit the floor as I grabbed for the shelf. Everything landed safely except for a bottle of Eucalyptus essential oil. The bottle is tiny, but the oil packs a punch. Some of it spilled across the back end of two pairs of slides, and some of it dripped onto, and into the carpet.

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I’m a hoarder.
I don’t intend to be one, but it seems that I am. My niece was helping me organize the pantry this evening, and she brought to my attention the fact that I have enough candles to light most of Illinois.
I love candles, especially this time of the year. I love the pumpkin spice scented ones and those that are spiced apple scented. I like the warmth of the flame, and the homey feeling they give the house.

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I’m one of those people, those old fogies, who believe that you shouldn’t celebrate Christmas until you have celebrated Thanksgiving. It disturbs me to go to a mall in mid-October and see it dressed for Christmas, and to see them hawking merchandise on the basis of it’s “gift appeal.”
I can understand towns and villages wanting to get the decorations up while the weather is still reasonably warm. I can deal with that sort of thing as long as the decorations are not lighted until the day after Thanksgiving.
I know….I’m a grinch. But it seems to me that we have lost the entire point of the celebration of Christmas in the overflow of merchandise and garish decorations.

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