Visit

I rarely see extended family and it was a treat to have so many come yesterday. My cousin Gregg with his wife Karen came to see a Reds game (they won) and brought along parents Uncle Darvin and Aunt Evelyn for a visit. Gregg's daughter Allison with her husband Kevin drove to the game separately. After the game we all had LaRosa's pizza and Northwest Ohio cantelope, and Steph, Mike, and the kids joined us.

My aunt and uncle are 88 and in reasonably good health. It's been a family question for years: how come Aunt Evelyn never looks any older? Darvin is my mother's brother, so I can't hope for Evelyn's genes. I'm pretty sure Gregg got them, though.

My energy is slowly making its way back, and on Saturday I finished the center of a Christmas gift table topper (Anita Goodesign Seeing Double.) One side has red prints, one of which is Christmas-related but very subtle.

The other side has cherry prints.

I enjoy the patient construction of these. One or two panels a day and then one day, it's finished. My next will be in browns and golds, a wedding gift for a couple marrying in December.

While Mike was here, he swapped out washers for me. I've loved my GE washer with the mini-basket and it was my second one. The mini-basket sets inside the washer and will do tiny loads with two gallons of water. Perfect for sweaters or something red or something needed for the next day. For the past months, though, it's been leaking water from the bottom and yesterday the pump just refused to drain the water.

Luckily for me, a washer and dryer came with the house when I bought it, so no shopping was involved. There was oily stuff on the basement floor under the old washer, definitely time to retire it. This morning I washed a load of towels and was amazed at how dry they were at the end of the cycle.

Many thanks to Mike.