Celia's Blue Planet

At the Tuesday night family dinner we planned out a lot of Thanksgiving dinner.  As far as we know there will be 17 of us. A smaller number than in years past. Eight of them are my youngest son's kids;  the ninth one is married and now has conflicting holiday requests to process. We'll gather at his house.  It's a big house and the kids have room to roam inside and out.

I'm in charge of green beans and devilled eggs. Not a green bean casserole though, these are cooked in heaps of bacon and almonds. I put avacado in some of the eggs and once they got used to green eggs (and no ham) they were the first ones to be eaten. Interestingly much less dessert than usual. I wonder if that will make it to the finish line.  It already made me think about making and bringing a cheesecake, maybe pumpkin cheesecake, with chocolate. OMG.

Fall is racing by. We have sun and 50 again today replacing the freezing, day long fogs we had last week. I'm going for a walk in this park as it …

I voted as soon as our ballots arrived and returned it promptly.  Today I am avoiding the news as I have considerable anxiety about the outcome. Fingers crossed, etc. So glad Washington does mail in ballots. For one thing it allows me to sit at the dining room table and re-read the content of the items carefully in peace. And of course it's very convenient.  You don't even have to put a stamp on it in Washington State.

I was going to to post every Friday but got derailed as usual. Looks more like once a month. How did it get to be November so soon? I did some early Christmas shopping.  I hate to admit I'm at it this early. Eleven grandkids and this year I am tired of handing envelopes of money.

Our leaves here have lost most of the color right now. I'm going to take the grandkids for a drive up into the hills today to see if we can get some photos.  I haven't taken any for quite a long time and I need to exercise my camera and me.

Hope we all get what we need from …

Fall is here.  Makes me hungry, I'm a big fan of squash, squash soup and squash in soups, and just plain baked and mashed squash. Yum!  My two favorites are butternut (for soup) and spagetti squash under all kinds of sauces. Makes great spagetti and meatballs especially if you have wheat (me) or gluten problems (not me). Baked Spagetti Squash with garlic and butter sidedish. This was very tasty and simple.  Here's a soup recipe I've used. Transferring the soup to the blender is a pain but worth it. Delicious butternut squash soup recipe.



This weekend we just had the Walla Walla Balloon Stampede.  The weather was perfect, chilly but sunny and little or no wind.  The previous two years our balloon fest was blown away by inclement windy weather.  The photo below was taken as the balloon drifted over Pioneer Park here.  Wonder what the ducks thought. Our little city is small enough that these balloons are almost garunteed to drift over your house. You'd know because you ca…

I've been reading the book Ronni Bennett reviewed August 20th on her blog Time Goes By "Advice for Future Corpses"  "*And Those Who Love Them," by Sallie Tisdale. I really appreciate it.  I wish it had been printed before my either of my parents died.  I want my sons to read it, and my sisters, it spoke to me that much.  Her words came to me as I once again process my rocky relationship with my mom. For whatever reason I've been thinking about Mama again, a lot.


Mama died in a nursing home (my father's choice not hers or ours) over a period of about a month. My life, all of our lives, were made up of spending as much time with her a possible. My youngest sister camped out in her room a couple of nights a week. I drove from Seattle to Portland and stayed every weekend and in between as emergencies occurred. She was alert and angry; angry at Dad for violating their agreed on plan and putting her into care; angry at dying; angry at us for not taking her aw…

This isn't what I planned to write about this morning. I had meant to write how life keeps changing our/my plans and then I saw this on NPR.  NPR Hurricane Florence arrives.  These are changes I've not ever had to experience. I can only imagine what this woman must be feeling or thinking driven out of her home with perhaps nothing but her medicines and her little dog. These people must be suffering great grief and fear.  How can she begin again?



Photo from NPR by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

And right before this we find out that this summer the Trump administration transferred nearly $10 million away from FEMA to ICE.  To build jails for little kids! Yes I am biased, biased and angry. 


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The Fair is over again.  I went to watch my grandgirl Mya and her boyfriend Emerson show the pigs they raised this year in FFA and stayed for most of the day.  They worked hard and did well.  He took first place in their class and she was first runner-up behind him.  I didn't get as any photos having brought only my phone and it chose that day to have a twit.  Couldn't text or nuttin'.  These are my son Dave's photos.  I can't remember what she named her so I am just calling her Miss Piggie.


Mya and Miss Piggie pre-show.


Mya putting Miss Piggie through the drill.
Those kids all looked so cute in their FFA jackets, clean and professional.  They all put in great effort and it showed.  Most of our family showed up and we filled up half of one of the bleachers. Good show family!
Later Dave and I roamed around after getting some food. We had Hawaiian pulled pork and rice first. Mmmm.  I'd only had coffee for breakfast. Then we sat in the shade and listened to a goo…