Just Under the Wire

 When the pandemic shut the world down, one of the big concerns this year, for me personally, was would we get to have our scrapbooking weekend at the end of October. This is an event I look foreward to each year. Its three days of crafting with my friends, guilt free and uninterrupted. Its lots of fun, laughter and creativity with people I really like. Well, in the end. our big group had to cave in and cancel. Heartbreak ensued all around.

The Banker, the Sailor, KitKat and I decided that if we could find a place we would have an event of our own. We have a core group of eight of us that get together for this event. We found a place, we organised it and we managed to have it. Just under the wire because as of this Monday we went back into code orange, basically lock down. No groups bigger that 5, quarantining if you travel for 14 days, etc etc.

I cannot tell you how glad I was that we got this accomplished before things went south again. 

We were at a local Senior Center, we had rules to follow and they treated us like royalty. So friendly, so helpful, so accommodating. They set up the tables and chairs, provided coffee and the room had super good lighting. 

I managed to get 78 pages together, I still need to do some journalling and add embellishments here and there but I got January to September done. 

The Banker's sister makes her own embellishments. I want to give this a try. I doubt I will be able to do the incredible job she does but I want to give it a try. Embellishments are a horrible price and if I could make them it would be a benefit.

We had a "True North Strong" gift basket put together and raffled it off this year instead of doing our quilt raffle. We raised $400.00 for the local Safe and Warm Shelter. Teddy Bear was the lucky winner of this lovely gift bag.

We also put a shout out for food stuff for the local food bank and the Safe and Warm Shelter. The Banker and I will drop this stuff off when we take the raffle money down. I think we did good.

We had three days from 9:00 am to 10:00 pm and the room rental was very reasonable. We brought our own lunches and ordered in suppers. The Banker brought us cake and we brought our own snacks and drinks. All in all it was a successful weekend, everyone was pleased and we are hoping at some point, early in the next year, we can do it again. Covid co-operating with us of course.

Today I went to run some errands and I noticed the lids on my garbage and recycle dumpsters were flipped open. On closer inspection I discovered some determined person had diligently torn open all of my garbage bags, rooted through them and transferred most of it from the garbage to the recycle dumpster. 

I guess I should be grateful that they did not scatter it all on the ground. That thought did not stop me from cussing them out when I found it. Its all back in its proper spot and the dumpster is out for pick up tomorrow. It was just an annoyance. I cannot imagine rummaging about in stinky weeks old garbage. Yuck. I got enough of it having to move it all back to the right dumpster.

I was not home for Halloween, first time in years I did not hand out candy. I had already decided I would not do anything this year. I hardly get any children and most of the houses on my street don't bother. So I did not decorate, I did not put my lights on and it makes me a little sad. Numbers were down all around because of the virus but kids were out and about.

So now I need to work on putting the scrapbooking equipment back in its proper spots. Get at the next projects I have on the agenda and a million other everyday things that need to be done. 

Toodles,

Linda