90/365 - Kris Buying a Vacuum

Today Kristen asked Paul and I if we would help her pick out a vacuum cleaner at Sears (far be it from me to stifle any type of emerging cleaning genes). This is Paul and Kris looking at the different models. Here's to keeping clean floors at the Gonsalves!

89/365 - Borders

Monday night at Borders. We almost always have tea (sometimes goodies, but not tonight). I love the paperback books Images of America series. Tonight I read Holyoke, and Feeding Hills Revisited.

88/365 - Easter Eggs

This was the finished product of our egg dyeing. Those who worked on the eggs were Marley, Janelle, her sister Amy, Mark and Toby (Kristen was busy knitting a project for a deadline at Webbs). You can go to Debbie's Blog to see pictures of the process (as soon as I get them ready).

Dyeing Easter Eggs

This afternoon we dyed Easter eggs. It was a little early, but Mark and Janelle, Janelle's sister along with Kris, Toby and Marley were here for dinner, and I thought it would be more fun for Marley to have more people to do eggs with. I must be getting old though. First of all, you were supposed to add the dye tablets to the vinegar, and I added it to the water and vinegar. It took forever for them to dissolve (check out the above picture with them looking into the cup, waiting for the dye tab to disappear. They eventually had to crush them). Also, I used cider vinegar instead of white vinegar, and eventually found out that was why the colors were so muted. Oh well, live and learn. I hope I can remember that for next year! Mark and Toby got involved too. It was a fun day.

P.S. I'm not sure why most of my pictures came out so bad, but I wanted to post them anyway. I think my battery was low.

87/365 - Dyeing Easter Eggs

Getting ready to dye eggs tomorrow!

86/365 - Marley's Lincoln Log Village

Marley got some Lincoln Logs for Christmas this year. Tonight she created this little "village." Left to right - the farmhouse, the mansion with six rooms, the Indian camp, and the meeting room (have I mentioned lately how much I love this kid!)

85/365 - Nancy Drew

As many of you know, I love Nancy Drew books (see Debbie's Blog, Sept. 9, 2008). So, tonight we went grocery shopping and Paul spotted a bin with old books for sale (proceeds to go to the Jimmy Fund), including many old Nancy Drew books. Well, of course, I didn't remember which ones I already had, so Paul kept on grocery shopping while I went home to make a list of my ND books. I ended up getting nine new books. When I got home I "googled" Nancy Drew books check list, and found out that there were 101 of them written. Now I'm on the hunt!

84/365 - The Easter Bunny?

Could the Easter bunny have arrived? I know some people don't like bunnies in their yards because they eat in their gardens, but I still get excited every time I see one in my yard. Isn't nature wonderful? Look how he just blends in with the landscape!

83/365 - Izzy Helps Out with Taxes

Today Izzy helped Paul do taxes. She knows she not supposed to be on the kitchen table, but she also knows Paul is not as strict as me!

82/365 - Is it Spring Yet?

Is this really Spring weather? It's been below freezing all day! I was thinking that I need to change my header picture to a Spring picture, but now I'm not so sure.

Janelle at 29 weeks

Today Janelle's mom, Stacia, and her sister Amy came for a visit. They wanted to see Kris and Toby's new house so we had pizza there. I wanted to take some pictures of Janelle pregnant; she is 29 weeks, and I also took some pictures of the three of them. I think they came out cute.

81/365 - The Joyce Girls

Today Janelle's mom and sister came to visit and we had dinner at Kris and Toby's house.

80/365 - Buying sneakers at LL Bean, S. Windsor

Today (after work) Paul and I drove to S. Windsor, CT to LL Bean. To me, this store is a tease to the store in Freeport, but I really needed sneakers and I wanted to get them at LL Bean. The last time I bought sneakers was 9 years ago. They didn't have the same kind I got last time (they said they only had them at the Maine store) so I got a new type. They are Merrell Siren Sport, a light hiker/walking shoe (grey/lime). They are very comfortable. It's almost light enough outside for me to start walking in the morning again (my yoga is not working out so well).

79/365 - First Signs of Spring

First sign of Spring. These are day lillies growing in my yard.

78/365 - Water Main Break

Yesterday downtown Springfield had a huge water main break. According to the Springfield paper "More than 5.5 million gallons of water spewed on to city streets early Wednesday when a major water main broke at Main and Carew streets." It "...created traffic problems, forced schools to close, disrupted water service and affected the water supplies of at least two communities." We took a ride by the scene tonight.

Throwback Thursday - Mt Tom, Choquette's

I had today off from work because I have to work Saturday. Paul was feeling a little better today and since it was such a beautiful day, we decided to take a short drive. We ended up on Mt. Tom Reservation. This reminded me of one of my Sunday School teachers who lived very close to the reservation. I think I was in 5th grade. She had her Sunday School class over for a sleepover (brave woman). Her daughter was in my class also. We all slept in the living room and the next day we hiked from her house up the mountain to Goat Peak, an observation tower. It seemed like the longest walk I had ever been on (we timed it today, it was 2 miles). This was probably when I found out that I was scared of heights. We all climbed up the tower, but when I got to the top I was so scared that I sat down in the middle of the floor. My friend, Karen, was sitting on the edge of the fence around the top of the tower (until her mother made her get down). I was horrified. I didn't know if I was even going to be able to get down the tower. I thought my friend was the luckiest person in the world to live in such a neat place!

My friend Karen's house at the base of Mt. Tom

Throwback Thursday - Smith College, HCC Graduation

I like the idea of Throwback Thursday so every now and then when one strikes I will blog it.

Today we were driving through Northampton and we passed this building which is part of Smith College.

When I went to Holyoke Community College, 1968-1970, they didn't really have their own buildings. Their main building had been the old Holyoke High School on Sergeant St. A new high school was built on Beech St. in 1964 and the old high school was renovated for the college. This building burned down in January 1968 just a few months after moving in. When I started in September 1968, they were using temporary places. One was the Baptist Church on Northampton St.; I had Sociology there. That winter, because the buildings were so spread out, they decided to let the girls wear slacks because of the cold. It seems archaic, doesn't it? In 1969 they finished building what was to be their main building (in later years used as a daycare, and in later later years torn down and a new senior center built).

All this to say, when I graduated in 1970, they really didn't have a place to have the graduation ceremony.

They used one of the buildings at Smith College. It was a joke for awhile that I graduated from Smith College. The night of the graduation, Paul showed up in his (our) brand new, just picked up that day, 1970 baby blue Volkswagen. It was a very exciting night, until on the way home I realized that I had left my pocketbook in the basement of the building where we had changed into our gowns. We went back to the building but everyone was gone and it was basically closed up. Somehow, I can't remember exactly (I think we climbed in a window), we got into the basement of the building. Paul had a flashlight and we started looking for my pocketbook. Within a short time a security guard found us and asked us what we were doing in the building. We told him about my pocketbook, but he said we weren't allowed to stay in there. He took my name and my work phone number and the next day I got a call at work that they had found my pocketbook.

(This is from a page in my old scrapbook; the Holyoke Community College invitation, and the message from the security guard at Smith College.)

As I was working that day and Paul wasn't (sounds familiar) Paul went to the Smith College Security to claim it. Talk about young and foolish!

77/365 - Grapefruit during "24"

I'm not sure how it started but for a couple of years now, every time the TV show 24 is on, I have to have a grapefruit. It usually takes me most of the hour to eat it - I eat the membranes and all. Tonight after I got home from Prims I remembered that I hadn't taken my picture of the day yet. I spotted the grapefruit and decided to take a picture and then eat it!

76/365 - Christmas Cactus (and Izzy)

Today's picture was supposed to be my Christmas cactus that was in bloom, but Izzy just looked so cute beneath it that I had to get her in the picture too!

75/365 - Stomach bug

Guess what has hit our house? Yep, the stomach flu bug. Paul woke up with it yesterday. Tonight he is starting to feel a little bit better; at least he has a partial appetite. I just hope that bug doesn't bite me!

74/365 - Dinner at Kris and Toby's

We had dinner at Kris and Toby's today. I had planned a corned beef and cabbage dinner at my house, but plans got changed when Paul woke up with the stomach flu :(

Janelle is 28 weeks' pregnant, baby about 2 1/2 to 3 lbs. I think she looks so cute!

73/365 - Dan and Joanie Charko's old house

We went for a ride to Vermont again today via Easthampton (Paul's new favorite hot dog stand). I wanted to see if we could find our friends Danny and Joanie's first house in Easthampton. I was surprised that we still remembered how to get there. I think they bought this house around 1972. When they lived there the house was red with striped cloth awnings, perfect grass and cement walks in the back yard. We had a lot of fun times in that house.

72/365 - Leslee at Noble Transcription

This is my friend Leslee from work. We had a rather historic happening this afternoon. We have always had pre-printed logos on the paper we use to print our reports (at least in the almost 12 years I have been there). We are soon (hopefully) going to a new system where we will be using plain paper and the logo will be part of the report template. So, this afternoon we got rather sentimental when Leslee said, "This is our last box of printed paper that I am putting in the printer." I said that I should take a picture to remember it. She agreed and posed with the paper. It was definitely a silly Friday afternoon!

71/365 - Hydrangea cuttings

These are hydrangea cuttings that I have been rooting since last September. Paul, Marley and I went to the Cape to visit Paul's aunt and uncle. His Aunt Judy has the most beautiful purple hydrangea plants along one side of her house. She gave me some cuttings, wrapped in wet paper towels, to bring home. She said they were real "easy" to root. I bought some vermiculite and put them in pots near a window in an unused upstairs bedroom (it was the only place I could put them away from Izzy). The only problem is that we don't have the heat on in that bedroom. In the beginning I kept them "misted" every day. But as the winter went on, and it was cold in that room, I wasn't as faithful. I'm not sure if they are still alive or not. I guess I'll know when I go to plant them, if they have any roots. I'll keep you posted.

70/365 - Recipe for Corned Beef

My son-in-law asked me to e-mail him this recipe for corned beef. It's a different way of cooking it, baking as opposed to boiling it. My friend Liz at Noble gave me the recipe.  My family loves it!

P.S. Click on the picture to enlarge it.

69/365 - One of Paul's found hot dog stands

I think Paul's nose can sniff out a hot dog stand....anywhere. He spotted this on one of his trips up to Eastampton to help Caroline (the lady we moved last week) find some of her things in the "millions" of boxes in the cellar of her new home. Today, on our way to the scrapbook store in Vermont, we went by way of Easthampton. I have to say, those hot dogs were pretty good!

68/365 - 99

Tonight we ate at the 99 Restaurant at the Mall (before going to Borders). It is only the second time we have ever been there. The first time, we were surprised to see that they served popcorn before the meal. Tonight, by the time I got done trying to get a decent picture of Paul (I was too close in the booth and too lazy to get up and get further away) he had eaten all the popcorn!

67/365 - Marley's last basketball game

Today was Marley's last basketball game, actually a makeup game. She is the one (the only one) with her arms up. She really does have that down pat; the rest of the game?....time will tell.