Ten Things of Thankful

 Are you ready? I have been thinking about it, and now I am ready to share my Ten Things of Thankful. Week after week I reflect upon what has been going on and then consider where the "thankfuls" might be hiding among all that menagerie of what we call life. I hope you have found yours and are linking up to the blog hop Ten Things of Thankful, hosted by Kristi of Thankful Me.

1. Vinegar

After departing with a very old house plant this week, I debated as to whether I could bring the pan that had been used as a plant saucer back to its original condition. Removing the dirt and iron stains from pan almost seemed like an impossible task, but after using some elbow grease among other things, I had gotten most of the stains removed, except for some lingering marks shown in the photo below. After pouring some white vinegar in the pan and letting it set for a couple of hours, I was able to scrub away the remaining stains and it was good as new. 

Pan showing iron stains in the bottom

2. Labels

I discovered a label on the above pan that said it was a browning pan and was to be used only in a microwave oven. (The plant with the pan being used as a plant saucer had been given to me years ago.) Note: If you shop at garage sales or thrift shops and come across a pan similar to this one that has a patch of gray on the bottom about the size of a range burner, it is probably a browning pan and must only be used in a microwave oven or possibly as a serving dish.

3. Knowing when the time has come

Some of our house plants had become too large, or too unbecoming, to be enjoyable anymore. When the guys were here doing some cleaning up of our property and taking away the fallen limbs, etc. they took away these old plants.

4. Paper shredder

The paper shredder we bought recently can cross-cut thicker bundles of papers which is very helpful as I begin a shredding project that will keep me busy for I don’t know how long, but needs to be done.

5. Property clean up

Sometimes trying to prune out-of-control  ground  cover shrubs is like trying to cut out-of-control hair after months of not going to a beauty salon because of the pandemic (which is what I suspect the person who eventually cuts my hair might think). Well, at least the shrubs are looking better thanks to the guys who tackled that job. We will still be doing more in this area in the fall, but this was a huge improvement!

Recently pruned ground cover shrubs

6. Figuring out why a couple of checks had not cleared 

We had been given the wrong address labels to use, so the checks had been sent to the wrong destination. One piece of information we had been given had the right address, but the address labels didn’t match, and I had not even noticed. My attention to details failed the test this time, but on the other hand, I eventually figured it out.

7. Calling a state office and not having to wait forever to talk to someone who could answer my question

I was all prepared to have to wait on hold, so this was a pleasant surprise.

8. Chipmunks

This week I saw a Townsend’s chipmunk (http://animalia.bio/townsends-chipmunk), the chipmunk that lives in our area of the state. I don’t  see them very often, but there was one  trying to cross the road as I was approaching in the other lane. He couldn’t seem to decide whether he should try to race across the road and instead did a series of start and stops before finally making a dash for it. I slowed down because I really didn’t want to hit it. It is much more common for me to see ground squirrels racing across the road. They seem to have a much more dare devil approach to life than this little chipmunk did. The following video from the CBC is sure to take your mind off whatever ails you, and it has a chipmunk as its star.

9. Tracking information

If it had not been for receiving an email notifying us that an order of checks had been delivered the previous day, I wouldn’t have known to ask the postal clerk about our checks that were not in our PO box. Perhaps on a hunch she looked around and found it in a PO box near ours. 

10. Things that make me laugh

There will be more about this next week.

And as always, I am thankful for Vic and our family.

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